


a game of telephone

by venomondenim



Series: venom's starker collection [14]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: A whole lot of angst, Aged-Up Peter Parker, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst, Anniversary, Barebacking, Blowjobs, Boys In Love, Canon Compliant to a Point, College Student Peter Parker, Come as Lube, Consensual Sex, Crying During Sex, Emotional Sex, Fluff and Smut, Grinding, Happy Ending, I promise, Intercrural Sex, Jealous Tony, M/M, Miscommunication, Nightmares, No prep sex, Peter Parker Whump, Pining, Riding, Sex, Slow Dancing, Smut, Underage Drinking, divorced pepper and tony, events of infinity war and endgame happened just nobody died, handjobs, honestly peter and tony are both dumb dumb boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:40:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 33,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26866807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/venomondenim/pseuds/venomondenim
Summary: Mr. Stark died.But then he came back to life.Mr. Stark had brought back the whole universe. And apparently, because the stones suddenly believed in fairness, they had brought Mr. Stark back too.Peter could understand. He could understand a little too well. If the stones had touched Tony, it made sense how they wouldn’t want to let him go.The thought hit him like a bucket of ice. When had he gone from Mr. Stark to Tony?The same time you came back and stopped lying to yourself, a voice in the back of his head replied all too helpfully. Even though it wasn’t helpful, not in the slightest.Miscommunication Prompt Fill
Relationships: Peter Parker/Tony Stark, Quentin Beck/Peter Parker (Mentioned)
Series: venom's starker collection [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2054016
Comments: 53
Kudos: 348





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [honeymoons](https://archiveofourown.org/users/honeymoons/gifts), [theMadStarker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theMadStarker/gifts).



> This will be posted in two parts. I have a little bit written of the next part, and I know where I'm going. Not sure when it'll be up, but you shouldn't have to wait too long. I'm so excited to _finally_ get this monster up and out there. I've been working on this thing since July! I wrote the first 10k really quickly and then abandoned this poor baby to work on a million other projects these past few months. I've been editing it and looking through it the past few days and finally feel like I actually have a hold on finishing it. So, cheers mate. 
> 
> All the love and thanks goes to my glorious beta [theMadStarker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theMadStarker/pseuds/theMadStarker) who's just the absolute best. They're so encouraging, listens to all of my ideas, and beat this fic into submission like it was nothing. Don't know what I'd do without you, Mads. <3
> 
> This fic comes from the prompt that I was given AGES ago. I'm so sorry this took so long, Julie. It was always on my mind though, I promise! I hope it's everything you could ever want and more. 
> 
> Prompt: Miscommunication
> 
> _"the two of them cave to their feelings and hook up one night but misconceptions and miscommunication ensues: one of them thinks they're dating; the other one thinks it's just a casual fling/friends with benefits thing. in the end they're both actually in love with each other though. just a lot of angst with a happy ending"_

Things were weird ever since Peter came back from space. 

Correction: things had been weird ever since he got bit by a radioactive spider on a field trip to Hammer Tech in Queens when he was 14. Things had been weird ever since Tony Stark, of all people, recruited him; and then he was fighting alongside the Avengers in Germany, nevermind the fact that the week earlier, he hadn’t even been in the possession of a passport. He thought that they took longer to get, but he figured if anyone could smuggle a minor across country borders, it was probably billionaire Tony Stark. 

Then things continued to get weirder, though, Peter accepted it because that was the life of a superhero. Things would most likely be weird for the rest of his life (until it got ended) and he had made his peace with that. He really had. But then, he was sneaking onto a spaceship because suddenly, his entire world could be ending, and what, he was supposed to just stay back and watch? He was Spider-Man, he couldn’t not help. It’s what he did. He threw himself into fights and never thought about what would happen if he didn’t make it out on the other side. 

Then he went to space. He fought with aliens, and if he thought meeting the Avengers was mind-blowing, meeting the _Guardians of the Galaxy_ \- the _galaxy_. woah. - was even more unbelievable. He helped them fight Thanos, who Mr. Stark apparently had been having nightmares about since the Battle of New York but thought it wasn’t helpful to mention to anyone. He helped fight Thanos because it was in his blood just as much as the venom from the spiderbite. Peter Parker helped people and saved them when he could. 

It was a great plan. The odds had worked in his favor. Even when he was at his most reckless and outnumbered, somehow, he still always came out of the fight unscathed. 

It was a great plan. Until it wasn’t. 

Until he watched, one by one, every person in their group fade to ashes. He watched with wide eyes as the feeling of failure sunk to the pit of his stomach. 

They hadn’t won. 

How could he have believed that he could make it out so easily? He looked over at Mr. Stark, who looked just about as scared as he felt. He said things. He couldn’t remember what he said because his spidey-senses were screaming too loud at the prospect of _danger! danger! danger!_ like he hadn’t already been aware of the fact. His hands and then his arm turned to ash, and he was trying to hold onto Mr. Stark as hard as he could but he couldn’t feel his limbs anymore. Mr. Stark must have put them on the ground because suddenly, he was looking at the sky. 

The two words he did remember saying crystal clear were, “I’m sorry,” as the world faded to black. 

__

Then he woke up. He woke up like it had been five minutes instead of however long it had been, and Dr. Strange was tugging him into another fight. A fight that they couldn’t lose this time, the whole universe was counting on them. No pressure. 

Despite everything, they _won_. 

Mr. Stark died. 

But then he came back to life. 

His heart started beating again on its own accord, and his charred arm and shoulder healed up like magic. The stones had brought him back to repay the debt he had paid to the universe. Dr. Strange droned on about how the stones were sentient and liked the pure of heart, or at least, intentions that had been pure. Mr. Stark had brought back the whole universe. And apparently, because the stones suddenly believed in fairness, they had brought Mr. Stark back too. 

Peter could understand. He could understand a little too well. If the stones had touched Tony, it made sense how they wouldn’t want to let him go. 

The thought hit him like a bucket of ice. When had he gone from Mr. Stark to Tony? 

_The same time you came back and stopped lying to yourself_ , a voice in the back of his head replied all too helpfully. Even though it wasn’t helpful, not in the slightest. 

__

Things were weird when he came back. It was like he couldn’t settle into his skin. He went through something world-altering, existential, and heart-wrenching. And he couldn’t even talk about it. He felt like he had aged five years in a few months. 

He knew he should be grateful that everyone was back, that they had saved the universe again. That notion didn’t stop how he felt or how off the whole world seemed. He should be grateful, but he didn’t feel very grateful at night when all he could dream was of ash. 

Now, he was supposed to go back to his regular life like nothing had happened. He was supposed to go to class and actually worry about his grades or deadlines, or God, high school _gossip_. He was supposed to build lego models with Ned like he hadn’t been outside of the atmosphere. Like he hadn’t fucking died. 

It was mind-numbing in the worst way. He didn’t care anymore. He didn’t care about anything. What was the point when your reality could be completely altered in a second? 

How was he supposed to go on and handle being Peter Parker again instead of Spider-Man when the one person on the entire planet who knew what he was going through, who knew what it had felt like, wouldn’t even talk to him? 

College recruiters showed up to his high school and it made him want to throw up all day. He wanted to ask them when they were cheerily talking about statistics and different programs and dorm rooms– he wanted to ask what the best college to go to was, when instead of Physics, all Peter could think about was dying in his mentor’s ~~who you only realized you were in love with when you came back~~ arms. 

He stopped sleeping. 

He disabled all the trackers and emergency alerts in the suit and wondered if Tony would even notice, if he even checked anymore. He wanted to punch something or maybe break the Brooklyn Bridge. He knew deep down that breaking things wouldn’t make him feel better or give him any release, but that didn’t mean he didn’t want to. He wanted to break something, maybe to prove to himself that he wasn’t the broken one in the equation. 

He patrolled every night instead of sleeping. His grades slipped, but he didn’t care. He was a senior anyway, so it wasn’t like it mattered. Nothing mattered. Not when an alien could come down from the sky at any time and take it all away. 

The nightmares were bad. They seemed to come every time he closed his eyes. It wasn’t the same one every time, but there was one that definitely stuck out. 

He had to eat all his food undercooked. If anything was the slightest bit charred or burnt, even around the edges, his chest would tighten and all he could taste was ash. He was so sick of tasting ash. 

He patrolled until he was so tired that he passed out and only got two hours of sleep every night before school. It was the only thing that stopped the nightmares. 

He wasn’t very good at hiding it if the frown May gave him every morning as she rubbed her thumb over his under-eye bags were any indication. Her frown deepened with each passing morning as Peter pretended everything was fine and that he was just worried about the future and picking a college. 

Peter didn’t even want to go to college. But he had gotten good at doing what other people expected of him. It was what he did now. 

__

On his way to school one morning, he had missed the bus so he was forced to walk. He walked past several storefronts and restaurants until he came to a halt in front of a newsstand that was plastered with magazines all reading the same variation of the same story. 

Each one had a picture of Tony and Pepper. The picture of Pepper was recent, but the one of Tony had been photoshopped from years ago. Peter could tell. The main headline read: “Power Couple Done for Good: CEO Files for Divorce.” 

His fingers itched to reach for the phone that was heavy in his pocket. Then he remembered all the unanswered text messages and the lack of calls from Tony. He thought about how he had to find out that they had broken up from a magazine on the street like he was a stranger. Like he was everyone else. It stung. It was proof that everything he thought that they had built had crumbled somewhere along the way. His phone felt even heavier in his pocket, but he refrained from pulling it out as he continued his walk to school, face blank, and mind-racing. 

He thought he had meant something to Tony, but obviously not. 

__

Later that week when the college recruiters stopped by again, he didn’t even spare the MIT ones a second glance. He was tired of doing things for the sake of other people because clearly, it wasn’t a two-way street. 

The sad part was that he knew if Tony would just reach out to him, he would jump. It would be water under the bridge because he would do anything for Tony’s attention. 

__

Tony invited him to the Avengers compound. 

Peter tried not to be hurt over the fact that he had called Aunt May for permission and worked the whole thing out with her. He hadn’t even talked to Peter or asked him about it himself. Peter ignored it all though, because he was too excited at the prospect of seeing Tony again, of being in his presence. 

__

The excitement quickly died when he got to the compound and Tony held him at arm’s length the entire time. He barely talked to him or even spoke to him. Instead, he shoved him off on the other Avengers. Peter was so mad that he wanted to hate him, but he knew he couldn’t. 

He fantasized about hating him the entire ride home back to Queens, but his brain kept getting stuck on all the little details he had noticed. It got stuck on how awful he looked, like he hadn’t been getting any sleep, and his skin was tighter around the edges. Peter wanted to tell him about his nightmares and wanted to ask if he maybe dreamed about the same thing too. He didn’t though, because Tony was back to treating him like a damn intern. Peter didn’t know what was worse, being treated like a kid or like an intern. 

He got invited to the compound a few times after that and got to interact with some of the other Avengers for the first time. It should have been everything he wanted, and a part of it was. The visits started waning until eventually, they stopped altogether. Tony wouldn’t even be in a room alone with him anymore. He couldn’t hate him, but he could hate the situation. He could hate how Tony had thrown him into this life and then expected him to figure it all out without his help.

Most of all, he hated that despite how Tony was acting, he still worried about him. He still cared. He was pathetic. 

__

The next day, he filled out an application to Columbia because the recruiter had been nice, and it was the only school he could kind of stomach the thought of. 

__

He graduated high school. The only person who cheered him on from the stands was Aunt May. It didn’t hurt, it didn’t. 

That night, he dreamed about his parents. He didn’t even really remember them and hadn’t thought about them in so long that the memories were faded and felt almost surreal. He woke up crying and typed out a text to the contact ‘You Know Who I Am’:

_I graduated high school today. You weren’t there._

He never sent it. He was Spider-Man, but even he wasn’t brave enough for that. 

__

Tony had wanted him to go to MIT, and Peter couldn’t think of anything else he wanted less. He didn’t want to go to Boston. In his one act of defiance, he had applied to Columbia and then got in. 

He made a burner email account, sent his acceptance letter email to Tony, and then deleted the account so he wouldn’t have to deal with Tony’s reply. If he was going to act like he didn’t care then Peter wasn’t going to listen to him. 

It didn’t matter because Tony called him the next day. Peter stared at his phone for entirely too long as his brain tried to process the fact that Tony was calling him. He was actually calling him. Peter decided that he wasn’t going to answer. But then Tony called him again. Peter answered because he had never been good with self-control. The first thing Tony said was “Congratulations,” and Peter desperately ignored how his insides sang from the praise. “But kid, what ever happened to MIT?”

Peter made sure his voice was completely flat when he said, “I’m not leaving New York.”

The soft “oh” Tony had let out was surprised and Peter had to curl his fist. Peter had never wanted to leave New York. It was bred into every fiber of who he was. The fact that Tony had thought- If he had just been around- If he had just listened- Peter stopped that trail of thought quickly. How was Tony supposed to know him anymore if he couldn’t even be around him?

He had graduated from high school. He had just turned 18. He was exhausted with people treating him like a kid. “You’d know that if you talked to me anymore.” 

“Peter.”

“I don’t know what I did. But you didn’t have to shut me out. You’re the only one who-“ He squeezed his eyes shut tightly. He couldn’t say what he really wanted to say, so he settled on, “You’re the only one who knows everything about what happened, what I- what I saw. And then you shut me out.” He laughed weakly. “So yeah, fuck MIT. The Columbia recruiter was nicer anyway.” 

“You’ll be great at Columbia,” Tony said, and Peter kind of wanted to cry because that’s not what he wanted Tony to say at all. 

“Cool,” Peter said coldly. “Thanks for the call.” 

“Peter-“ Tony said, an echo of the first time.

“ _What_ ,” Peter ground out. 

“Fuck. Peter. I’m sorry,” Tony told him, the last part hushed. 

“Don’t say it unless you mean it,” Peter said harshly. 

“Of course, I mean it,” Tony said, completely seriously. “I’m sorry I shut you out. I shouldn’t have- I just. I didn’t want to drag you into things. Things that you should have never been a part of in the first place. You deserve to have a normal life, Peter.”

“Wow,” Peter said, lowly. “Out of all the people I thought would get it-“ He took a deep breath that hurt his chest. “I haven’t had a normal life since I was 14 and got bit by that radioactive spider. I wasn’t going to have a normal life, not after the first time I suited up as Spider-Man. I _am_ Spider-Man. It’s not something I can turn on or off. I’ve still been patrolling. I’ve still been fighting bad guys. I’m just not telling you about it now. Maybe you would know what I was doing if you spent more than five minutes alone with me. I went to fucking space, Tony, there’s no coming back from that, you should know that.” 

“Whatever happened to Mr. Stark?”

“I will _hang up_ ,” Peter seethed, on edge.

“No, don’t. I’m– I’m sorry, Peter. I really am, I’m sorry.” 

Peter dug the heels of his hands against his eyes. “Don’t. Don’t say it unless you mean it.”

“I mean it, Pete,” Tony told him earnestly. “I mean it.” 

“You didn’t come to my graduation.” 

Tony’s voice was heavy when he said, “You wanted me there?” 

The laugh Peter let out was completely humorless. “Of course, I wanted you there. But you weren’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Tony said because apparently, he was a broken record, and Peter was, honest to God, going to break something. He was.

“Prove it,” Peter said without hesitating. “If you’re sorry, prove it.” 

__

Their conversation must have broken whatever dam was holding Tony back because he did prove it. Or started to, at least. 

He slowly started inviting Peter to the compound again and to the lab. It was weird and tense at first, but eventually, it got better. Eventually, things went back to somewhat normal, and Peter was able to breathe easier. His heart still stuttered whenever Tony praised him or looked at him and let his gaze linger. But Peter had gotten good at ignoring his feelings at this point. 

__

Peter went to college. 

It wasn’t too different from high school, although he hated his roommate and spent most of his first semester getting drunk on the weekends at various room parties. He found whenever he drank was the only time he slept without nightmares. It was the same one every time, and he woke up only able to taste ash on his tongue. 

When Peter went home for winter break, he and his roommate both decided not to room together the next semester. Peter visited Tony at the Tower and acted like everything was fine when really, he was splintering apart.

__

He met Beck towards the end of his spring semester. As cliche as it was, he was Peter’s TA. He had been charming and had the same power and confidence to him that had made Peter immediately drawn to him, ~~not that it reminded him of anyone~~. 

They started dating, and things were pretty good, until they really, really weren’t. Until Peter’s old roommate, who he didn’t like, messaged him on Instagram and sent him pictures and videos from a party he went to where people had caught Beck making out with a girl who was in Peter’s class. Peter felt stupid and defeated. 

He broke up with Beck the next day and told himself he wasn’t going to look back. And he didn’t. He did get spectacularly drunk, though.

__

To be fair, nobody stopped him. It was like everyone on campus knew his boyfriend had cheated on him. It made his skin crawl, and he wanted to get so drunk he couldn’t see straight. 

He learned from enough high school parties that he was pretty much immune to alcohol poisoning and could get drunk quickly but would sober up just as fast. So he got into a rhythm, he took as many shots as he could and watched the room spin until he was puking in the toilet. He puked and laid on the floor until he felt too sober, and then started the cycle all over again. He was on his third go around, (it was the lying on the cool tile part) when he saw a hand shoving a phone at him. 

It was unlocked and pulled up on Tony’s contact. He had toyed with calling Tony the second time he had been drunk. That had been before he puked his guts out in the toilet again and decided that drinking more was an even better idea. He could vaguely make out that the girl who had grabbed his phone was telling him to call someone so he wouldn’t die. He wanted to laugh. If only she knew that him dying has been the start of all his problems. He wondered if Tony would find that funny. Probably not. 

He sobered up a little bit when he realized that the girl had taken his silence for ineptitude or him possibly being too drunk to perform motor functions because suddenly, she was calling the contact and pressing the phone to her ear. “Hello?” she said, and oh God, that meant Tony had picked up. “Yeah, can you come pick up your friend? He’s been puking for like two hours and nobody’s allowed to get alcohol poisoning on campus.” She squinted and seemed to assess Peter. “Dude, I don’t even know. He had like ten jell-o shots when I saw him, but that was two hours ago and everyone said he was pre-gaming like crazy.”

Then she shoved the phone towards Peter and tucked it under his ear. “He wants to talk to you,” she said before turning on her heel and leaving the bathroom. Peter would have strangled her if it wouldn’t have broken like, superhero ethic codes or whatever. 

“I’m fine, Tony,” Peter said quickly, trying his best not to slur. “I can’t get alcohol poisoning, you don’t have to get me.” 

“Because that’s not worrisome. Don’t even tell me how you know that, by the way,” Tony said into the phone, but there was a lot of rustling like he was moving around. 

“Are you coming to get me?” Peter asked, warming up to the idea if it meant he got to see Tony tonight. Mad or not, he still got to see him. 

“Yes. Where are you?”

“Dorms,” Peter said, slumping so that he was lying flat on the floor. The ceiling was spinning but it was kind of nice. “I like it when it’s spinny,” Peter said because apparently, he had no filter while drunk. “I’m not sad when it’s spinny.” 

He heard Tony swear under his breath. “Okay, no more drinking for you for a while. We can’t have you turning into an alcoholic. Not on my watch.” 

“You don’t even watch me,” Peter said, whining a little. 

Tony got quiet. They were approaching dangerous territory when he asked, his voice uncharacteristically soft, “Do you want me to?”

“Yeah,” Peter told him honestly. “All the time.” 

Tony didn’t say anything for a while, but when he did, all he said was, “Can you make it to the front of the dorms so I can pick you up? I really don’t want to bust up a frat party, but I will if I have to.” 

“‘S'not a frat party,” Peter mumbled but tested himself by lurching up into a sitting position. The room was a little less spinny and he could feel his healing factor kicking in, as well as his metabolism cycling the alcohol out of him. It was a blessing and a curse. Kind of like Tony, he thought absentmindedly. “I’ll be out front.” 

When he was able to stand up and stumble out of the bathroom, thankfully, he found Gwen who apparently had been looking for him. He leaned against her heavily as he told her he had to get outside to meet his ride. She wasn’t very strong, but even though Peter had well concealed strength, he wasn’t all too heavy. She guided him out of the party and down the stairs. By the time they got downstairs, he was feeling a little bit more sober but still wasn’t in the mindset to make good choices. 

As soon as they got out front, he saw the black car roll up. He hadn’t expected Tony to be so quick. But maybe he had taken a while to get off the floor. Time had flowed weird for a bit. 

Tony got out of the car, and he looked so good that Peter felt his heart stop then restart with vigor in his chest like he was an old school cartoon character. He was in a t-shirt and jeans, and Peter wanted to sink into his arms and never let go. 

When Tony was only a foot away, Gwen turned to Peter and said, “I’m sorry about Beck, by the way. What he did sucked.”

Peter was then reminded of why he had been drinking in the first place. That he wasn’t good enough. Not for Tony and not for Beck either it seemed. “Beck’s an asshole,” Peter said, way too loudly, but it deserved to be said. “Fuck Beck. That fucking prick.”

“Amen, sister,” Gwen said enthusiastically, before dumping Peter into Tony’s arms, and wow, wasn’t that nice. “If I see him around on campus, just know it’ll be on sight.” 

He heard Tony ask, “Who’s Beck?” faintly before Peter went completely lax in his arms like a dead weight. “Jesus Christ, kid,” Tony said as he hauled him over to the car, and somehow got the door open with one hand even though Peter made it much more difficult. “This looks terrible, I hope you know.”

Peter couldn’t help but start to giggle hysterically, because he was right. He was a fucking mess. He was a limp noodle in Tony Stark’s arms because he couldn’t hold his liquor and was crying over a boy he hadn’t even loved because he had cheated on him, all due to the universe making the decision that he wasn’t enough. He would never be enough. It was funny, really, when you thought about it. Or maybe when he thought about it because Tony was looking at him like he was crazy as he dumped him in the backseat. “Great, now we’ve reached the giggle box part of the evening.” 

Peter was giggling uncontrollably now as he choked out, pitching his voice to sound faux-scared. “Help! Iron Man roofied me!”

Tony’s eyes went wide as he covered Peter’s mouth. “Stop that. That’s not even funny. Please tell me someone didn’t actually roofie you.”

Peter’s giggles stopped and he said forlornly, “I wish.” He sighed. “I just got really drunk because I was angry.” 

“You shouldn’t say stuff like that,” Tony scolded him, then said, “Now, we’re back to the root of the issue. I know it’s the pot calling the kettle right now, but you don’t drink to get rid of feelings.” 

Peter snapped. “Well, when your boyfriend fucks some girl in your class and everyone you know has it on video, I think you deserve to get plastered.”

“Boyfriend?” Tony echoed, sounding shocked. Right. Peter hadn’t told him. Whatever. He was drunk and didn’t have time for Tony’s biphobia. 

“Not anymore,” Peter said a little pitifully, suddenly close to tears. Then he decided since he had already embarrassed himself to his full capacity, what was the point of holding anything back? “He was my TA.”

“Jesus Christ.” He heard Tony say, and it made something unwind in his stomach, something that didn’t feel good. He just wanted to go home. But Aunt May couldn’t see him like this. 

“Just take me back to the Tower,” is what he managed to say, wanting the conversation to be over. He hitched his knees to slide back so he was lying completely along with the backseat of the car. He pressed the back of his hand over his eyes so he didn’t have to look at Tony, and also so he could get his wits back. “I’ll be sober in about an hour so let me just enjoy this.”

Tony didn’t say anything else as he got into the car. He didn’t slam the door, but Peter kind of wished that he would have. At least then, Tony would have been giving him something and shown his cards instead of always keeping Peter at arm’s length. 

Peter laid in the backseat as they drove back to the Tower in silence. The radio wasn’t even on, and all Peter could hear was Tony’s breathing and the sounds of the road as they rode over every rock and speed bump. 

When the car rolled to a stop, Tony sat in the car and didn’t make any move to get out right away. He sat as the tension gathered in the air and Peter found himself asking, “Do you ever think about Titan?”

It wasn’t what he meant to ask, but once it came out, he couldn’t deny that he was dying to know the answer. 

He didn’t need his super-senses to pick up on Tony’s full-body flinch. 

“Because I think about Titan all the time. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. When I do dream, I taste ash when I wake up and I can feel myself dissolving. I felt it, you know.” His words were garbled and choked up but he couldn’t stop now that he started. He had to get it all out. “I felt it as I crumbled. I remember every word I said. Last week, someone burned popcorn in their dumb fucking dorm microwave and I had a panic attack because it smelled burnt. It smelled like fire, like ash, and it was like I was right back there.” His last words were said in a whisper. “It hurts, and you’re never here.”

“Of course I think about Titan,” Tony said, his voice tight. “You’re not the only one who has nightmares.” 

Peter blamed it on being drunk when he asked, “Do you dream about me? Because I dream about you every night.” 

“Peter,” came Tony’s voice, and oh, no, he was doing his faux-Dad voice. “You’re drunk.” 

Peter waved his hand. “Drunk mind, sober thoughts, or whatever the saying is.” 

To that, Tony didn’t reply. Instead, he just got out of the car and opened up the door to the backseat. Peter was just as miserable as he had been two hours ago, but he could already feel himself begin to sober up and was able to stand up on his own without Tony’s help. He followed him up through the doors and into the elevator that went to his private floor, silently. 

They padded into the living space - it was an open-concept and so expansive that it made Peter feel tiny and lonely in comparison. How did Tony live somewhere like this? He stopped dead in the middle of the living room and felt something in him kind of snap. He was so sick of pretending. He didn’t want to have to pretend anymore. It wasn’t really like he could screw up his and Tony’s relationship more. It was already beyond fucked up.

He turned to face Tony who was looking at him measuredly like he was expecting him to say something. “We should talk,” Peter said. 

Tony put his keys and wallet into the bowl that was on the counter and then gave Peter his full-attention. “What do you want to talk about?” 

Peter wrung his hands together in front of him. “Everything. Tony, I-” He swallowed, gathering up all his Spider-Man courage. It was now or never. “I miss you.” 

The smile that Tony gave him was sad. “I missed you too, kid.” 

Old wounds stung at his words. It didn’t feel like he had missed him. “So, let’s talk.” 

And they talked. 

They sat on the floor of the living room in front of the couch and talked about everything, spilling their guts to each other like maybe, they were friends. Like the trauma they shared could mend everything broken between them.

Peter told him about everything. He told him about high school, about college, about patrolling, about feeling empty, and how nothing was ever the same after coming back from Titan. How everyone expected him to go back to normal when everything in his life had drastically changed. In return, Tony told him about his nightmares, about how when he had come back, he hadn’t really been in a good place. He admitted that he had kept Peter away because he hadn’t wanted him to see him like that. Peter was this bright-eyed kid that he didn’t want to drag down. 

“I’m not bright-eyed,” Peter said, a little too jaded. “And I’m not a kid, anymore.” 

Tony’s eyes lingered over his and dragged all the way up his body like he was looking through him, then said, “Yeah. You’re not.” 

After that, the tone shifted. It was almost palpable. 

“So,” Tony said, his expression unreadable. “You want to talk about this Beck guy?”

Peter swallowed something acidic and bitter that had made its way up the back of his throat. “Not if I can’t drink any more tonight.” 

Tony smiled then, but it was wan. “Fair enough. But you can talk about it if you want to.” 

Peter shifted so that he wasn’t awkwardly lying on his legs like a pretzel. Super-flexibility or not, his foot was still falling asleep. He focused all of his attention on wiggling his toes and getting the blood flow back instead of Tony’s statement. The sad part was he _did_ want to talk about it with Tony. He just didn’t know how to without sounding pathetic. 

Peter sighed heavily. He was basically sober at this point in the night, morning? Didn’t matter. He wasn’t drunk enough to have the words spill out unconsciously, but he let the prospect of getting to talk it out with someone who wasn’t one of his friends or a viewer of the lovely video, wash over him until he warmed up more to the idea. 

He made sure to watch his toes and not Tony’s face when he said, “He’s the TA for my Organic Chemistry class. He- we-,” He fumbled for a second. “I wasn’t in love with him.” It felt important for him to let Tony know that. “I _thought_ we were exclusive though.” He laughed a little, mostly at himself. “Guess I should have known nobody’s exclusive in college.” Suddenly, he felt so stupid. He felt every bit the kid that he always protested he wasn’t. He had let Beck swindle him with smooth words and attention and had fallen hook-line sinker for his trap. The worst part was that Peter hadn’t even suspected anything was amiss until he got that video in his DMs.

He could feel tears burning at the back of his eyes, and he clenched his jaw to keep them at bay. He was most definitely not going to cry about his dumb boyfriend problems in front of Tony. He was pathetic, but he wasn’t that pathetic. At least, not yet. 

He sucked in a breath so big that it made his lungs burn. “My roommate from last semester, Jason, we never got along great.” He bit his lip when he realized how that sounded. “I mean he wasn’t terrible or anything, we just didn’t have anything in common and decided not to room together again this semester. My roommate now is cool though, he has a girlfriend so he’s literally never in the room. Anyway,” He flushed at being derailed so easily. “Jason messaged me two days ago and was all like, ‘I’m sending this to you before anyone else gets the chance’, which like, in retrospect was nice of him, but-” 

Peter cut himself off. God, he wanted a drink. He risked a glance at Tony, but he was just listening. His face didn’t give anything away. 

Peter picked at a stray hangnail, anxiously. “To save you the sordid details, I watched the video and found out my boyfriend was cheating on me.” Peter laughed again, a hollow empty thing. “I broke up with him yesterday, and he was such an asshole about it. I guess it was my fault for doing it publicly, but then, he had to go and imply in front of everyone that it was because I didn’t put out enough. Which was totally a lie, but, whatever.” 

Peter about toppled over when Tony stood up sharply, out of nowhere. Peter blinked at him owlishly as Tony went over to the kitchen counter and pulled out a bottle from one of the cabinets. 

“Hey!” Peter said, a little offended. “I thought I wasn’t allowed to drink anymore tonight.” 

“You’re not,” Tony said, and Peter wanted it noted that his voice almost sounded gruff. “I’m not supplying any minors with alcohol. I never said _I_ wasn’t drinking, though.”

Peter sputtered. “I’m not a minor!” 

Tony raised an eyebrow. “Okay, but you can’t drink legally, either.” 

Peter rolled his eyes. “Whatever. We don’t have to talk about my boy drama if it drives you to drinking.” He pointed accusingly at Tony. “You did ask.” 

Tony stared at the bottle on the counter like it would give him all the answers to life. “I did ask,” he conceded. 

The moment of brevity was nice, but because Peter wasn’t capable of taking nice things at face value. He couldn’t help but say, “I miss when we didn’t have to get drunk to talk to each other.” 

He watched Tony’s shoulders tense, and then, he slowly rolled them, artificially relaxing his posture. “And I remember you dying.” 

His words were flat, and it made something deep ache in Peter’s chest like someone had knocked the wind out of him. 

He didn’t know what else to say, so all he said was, “I remember dying, too.” 

It took a few seconds, but eventually, Tony nudged the bottle back and returned to where Peter was sitting on the floor. He sat back down into the position he had been in and Peter was so relieved, his stomach swooped like he was on one of the rides at Coney Island. 

“I know this doesn’t have much weight coming from me,” Tony said, and then he reached over to rub at Peter’s ankle that was close to him. His thumb rubbed over the patch of skin that was exposed between the top of his socks and the bottom of his jeans. It was so intimate, Peter’s heart thudded, and his mouth went dry. He couldn’t be misreading this, could he? 

Tony continued, “Have you ever thought about going to therapy?” 

Peter nearly reared back, startled at the question. “I went to grief counseling after Uncle Ben died,” he said carefully. “It kind of helped. I guess? I honestly don’t know. It wasn’t too long after everything that I got bit and started being Spider-Man, which is what really helped.”

“It probably would be good to talk to a professional, after everything you went through,” Tony said reasonably. 

“I mean, there’s free counseling at school but I can’t really talk about what I need to so what’s the point?” Tony kept rubbing at his ankle and it was making it hard for him to think.

“There’s some shrinks the Avengers have on payroll. We should have you talk to one of them.” Even in the darkness of the room, Peter could make out that he looked sad. “It’s something I should have recommended earlier. I can’t believe I never did.” 

Peter warmed up to the idea of talking to an _Avenger_ shrink. He tried to imagine what they would even be like.

“Whoever Nat’s therapist is, that’s who I want,” Peter told him, only half-kidding. 

Tony laughed then. His face looked less sad, just for a moment. “I thought we agreed that you weren’t going to be drinking anymore.” 

Peter asked because he couldn’t leave well enough alone. “Do _you_ go to therapy?” 

“No,” Tony admitted. “But I should.” His thumb went from a rubbing motion to a light patting. “You’re supposed to be better than me though, remember?”

Peter shivered slightly. “Right. Because those aren’t big shoes to fill.” 

“I’m going to tell you a secret,” Tony said, and Peter was listening.

“Are you finally going to tell me the Vegas ‘03 story? Because everyone says it’s a doozy.” 

Tony frowned. “I will do everything in my power for the rest of my life so that you never hear the ‘03 Vegas story. God, how do you even know about that?” 

Peter shrugged in a way that said ‘you have your secrets, I have mine.’ Peter waved his hand. “Tell me the secret.” 

Tony moved his hand up so it was brushing along Peter’s calf. It took everything inside of Peter to not think about it. “The secret is that you’re already better than me. You didn’t need all that fake Yoda crap. You were already better. Even when you were 15 and swung around the streets in your pajamas. You’ve always been ten times the hero I am, and will ever be. You got the same shit Rogers has flowing through his veins, and you know how much it pains me to give Steve a compliment. You’re just - you’re pure unadulterated _good_ Peter Parker.”

“You don’t mean that,” Peter said, even though it had sounded like he did. It was an earnest confession in the hazy glow of the dead of night. 

“I do,” Tony replied gravely. 

Peter let the words sink in as they settled into silence. He kind of wanted to cry or maybe scream. Tony was rubbing his leg and complimenting him. It was the sickest form of torture. He was a noble hero, sure, but that was all he was going to be to Tony and it hurt. 

He got lost in his head as his thoughts spiraled. He was smart, strong, and Tony had just said that he was better than him. It was great. It was the stuff he had fantasized about when he was 15 and starry-eyed over Tony Stark showing up in his bedroom. But the problem was that he wasn’t 15 anymore, and he didn’t want to be better than Tony. He wanted Tony to want him, but it was hitting him that that might never happen. 

Peter had spent his entire life being varying different degrees of not enough. If he had been enough, his parents wouldn’t have died. If he had been smart enough, he could’ve stopped Uncle Ben from being killed. If he pretended hard enough, he could convince Aunt May that he was okay even when he wasn’t. If he had been enough, they would have killed Thanos the first go around and saved everyone a world full of hurt. 

It took him a while to realize he had been crying when the words tumbled out. “I’ll never be enough, will I?” Tony was looking at him horrified but he couldn’t stop. “I wasn’t enough to kill Thanos. I wasn’t enough for Beck, and I’m not enough for-” _You_. He wanted to say but cut himself off before he could say it and destroy everything. 

Tony immediately lurched forward and pulled him into his arms. It felt so good that it made Peter want to cry harder. This was all he had been craving for the past year and he couldn’t even enjoy it because he was embarrassing himself and having a mental breakdown. 

The memory of Tony reaching for the car door and saying _“We’re not there yet,”_ echoed around in his brain as he focused on the feeling of his arms around him. Were they there yet, now? He wanted to ask. He didn’t though, because he didn’t want to ruin the moment. 

Then he heard the words that Tony was saying into his hair. “God, Peter, you’re enough. Of course, you’re enough. How could you even…? You’re enough.” 

Peter held onto Tony for dear life as he said wetly, “Yeah? _Prove it_.” 

Then Tony kissed him. 

It wasn’t open-mouthed or dirty. If anything, it was chaste. It served more to catch Peter off guard than it did to give him a chance to kiss back. When Tony pulled away, he didn’t even think twice before he was hauling him back in by the collar of his shirt. He slotted their lips together like he was starving and this was his last meal; his holy communion. All of his senses were buzzing and dialed up to eleven as he kissed him desperately. If this was his only chance to kiss Tony, he was going to make the most of it. 

He whined in the back of his throat when Tony opened his mouth and licked inside. It was better than any drug he could have even thought of trying. It was so good, he was worried his brain might melt from it. They kissed and kissed until Peter could feel his fingers start to cramp from how tight he was holding onto Tony’s bunched up collar, and his head was spinning - not from being drunk this time, though.

They kissed until Tony broke away harshly like he had just processed what they had been doing. “Peter-”

“Don’t tell me to stop. Because I really don’t want to stop,” Peter told him, not even caring at that point if he came across as pushy. “And don’t even say it’s ‘cause I’m drunk because I’m not even drunk anymore.” 

Instead of Tony saying any of those things, he just said, “This is a bad idea.” His declaration didn’t hold much weight considering he was already leaning back in and kissing Peter again. 

They kissed until Peter was panting against Tony’s mouth as he pulled away _again_. “Hold on, we should-” He seemed to take a steadying breath. “We should talk about this.”

“We’ve been talking,” Peter pointed out and started kissing over his neck to distract him. He had permission to kiss Tony, he wasn’t about to give that up to talk. “Then we were kissing. I think we should keep kissing.” 

“You just broke up with your boyfriend,” Tony barrelled on because apparently, he didn’t get the memo. “And I-” He sighed. “Look, Peter, I don’t– I need to warn you that I don’t really know how to be in a relationship with someone who isn’t Pepper.” 

Right. The divorce. Tony had just broken up with someone that he had been with for over a decade, which was kind of mind-blowing. Peter thought back to the newsstand with all the magazines and felt the usual hurt that accompanied it. Tony was basically telling him that he wasn’t looking for a relationship. Why would he be? Surely not with Peter, a 19 year-old college student of all people, Tony’s heartfelt monologue aside. 

It was fine, really. Peter knew exactly where he stood. Tony was definitely right, this was a bad idea. But Peter had spent too long wanting him to get this far and deny himself. He would take whatever Tony was willing to give him, even if it hurt him more in the process. He wasn’t about to give this up for anything. 

“I got it,” he said a little wildly. “Tony, I get it. It’s fine, I don’t expect you to…” He trailed off, then said with a little more finality, “I get it. Just. Keep kissing me? I might die if you don’t.” 

It wasn’t playing fair, but it worked anyway, enough to get Tony to groan and pull him in, slotting their lips together once again. 

Peter bit along Tony’s lip gently until he opened up wider and let his tongue slip in, curling it along the roof of his mouth. It was wet and dirty and perfect. Tony’s hand moved up until it cloaked the back of Peter’s neck in a vice grip, holding him tight as he licked his way inside. 

After a few minutes, Peter had to break away for air but used that time to start tugging at Tony’s shirt, trying to get it off. 

“Where did you learn to kiss like that?” Tony asked incredulously as his own fingers started toying with the bottom of Peter’s shirt. 

Peter gasped out a snarky, “College,” then assisted Tony by grabbing the collar of his shirt at the back of his neck and pulled it over his head, exposing his chest and arms. “Your turn,” he said once he started attacking Tony’s t-shirt once again and they managed to get it off with an impressive bout of teamwork. 

Peter brought their lips back together with a nearly bruising intensity. He couldn’t help but moan brokenly against Tony’s mouth as he got to run his hands over the older man’s arms, chest, and shoulders. This was everything he had been dreaming about for years but a million times better because this time, he could actually feel it. He could actually smell Tony’s cologne as it rubbed against his skin. Peter could lose himself in his touch and the way his breath hitched against Peter’s mouth.

Peter moved so that he was lying down onto the floor and Tony followed so that he was on top of him, chasing his mouth. He nudged Peter’s legs apart with his knee and settled on top of him into a straddle. He was everywhere, and Peter was so hard he could feel his dick straining against his jeans. God, why were they still wearing pants? He had to fight the urge to just grind against Tony’s hip until he came in his pants.

But Tony was still hung up on him being a ‘kid’, even though he definitely was not a kid anymore. He was pretty sure he lost kid status ever since he went toe to toe with Thanos. Even in the eyes of the law, he wasn’t a kid anymore. Despite that, losing control and humping against Tony like he was still a horny teenager was not the best route to defend his argument. 

He tried to get his brain to reboot so he could remember all the tricks he’d been slowly acquiring and storing up his sleeve. If this was going to be his only night with Tony, he wanted to be remembered as being as sexy as possible if he could help it. 

So, using a little of his super-strength he jerked his hips up then bent his knees and secured his feet flat against the floor. At that point, only his back was touching the floor and he was nearly supporting Tony’s entire weight with just his hips and thighs. He had him lifted up in an impressive move, allowing him to slip his way down. He inched his way down Tony’s body in a smooth glide until he was chest level with Tony’s waist.

Peter started unbuckling Tony’s belt with little finesse and debated the merits of pulling Tony’s zipper down with his teeth. He hadn’t heard any complaints the few times he had done it. He was aware enough to know that it was kinda slutty and was curious if, maybe, it was a little too far to do it with Tony right off the bat. 

“Okay,” Peter said, hoping he sounded more confident than he felt. “I can blow you right now, or you can take me back to that bed of yours and fuck me. I’m down with either. Dealer’s choice.” 

Tony’s hands stopped him on his belt, and Peter was going to ask him if he’d done something wrong until he saw his face. Tony’s head was tilted back, just enough to expose his throat where his Adam's apple was bobbing, and his eyes were half-lidded. Tony brought his hand up and grabbed Peter’s jaw until his thumb rubbed along his bottom lip. Peter wrapped his lips around it without a second thought and nipped lightly at the digit in teasing. 

“When did you get such a dirty mouth?” Tony asked. His voice was deep and breathy, and fuck, if it didn’t turn Peter on impossibly more. 

“Dealer’s choice has expired,” Peter told him once his thumb left his mouth. “You’re gonna fuck me because I need you inside me like, yesterday.” 

Tony groaned like he was in pain but ran his hands all up Peter’s exposed flank anway, like he couldn’t get enough. Eventually, he rolled off so he was no longer on top of Peter and sat up on his elbow right next to him. Peter took full advantage of the weight getting off of him and took no time standing up. 

Tony watched him, peering up at him hungrily from his position on the floor. Peter unbuttoned his jeans slowly. He wanted to put on, at least, a little show. He wasn’t normally one for a striptease, but he felt electric when Tony looked at him like that. Like he was something that was desirable. Here he thought he’d only see that expression in his fantasies, but he could conclusively say that the real thing was a million times better. It served to turn his blood into molten hot lava as it coursed through his veins. 

Carefully, he tugged down his zipper and shimmied his jeans down to his thighs, shaking his hips a little more than necessary. Once they got to his thighs, he shrugged them down all the way until they pooled around his ankles and he kicked them off. After his jeans were completely off, he took off his socks and threw them where his jeans had been haphazardly tossed. 

His stomach fizzled with anxiety as he realized he was now standing in front of Tony in only his boxers, his erection obvious through the thin fabric. He had to fight every instinct not to bring his hands over to his center and cover himself. It was easier when he focused on Tony’s blown pupils watching him. 

Peter turned, gathering all his false bravado, and looked back over his shoulder in a move that he hoped was enticing. “Down the hall, first door on the left, right?” he confirmed, praying that he left no room for confusion as to what he was getting at. 

When Tony only stared at him, not saying anything, he started padding back towards the bedroom anyway. His heart thudded with every step of his feet as he thought about lying on Tony’s bed and presenting himself to Tony. Even if he was just a rebound fuck, Peter was going to enjoy himself, at least for the night. Maybe if he was good enough, he could convince Tony to do it again sometime. He could master the art of seduction if he needed to. 

Once he got to the bedroom, he tried very hard not to think about the decision he was making or the possible ramifications for said decision in the morning. He would face it then. Right now? He was focused on getting Tony’s dick inside him if that was still an option. He crawled up on the bed and debated taking his boxers off but hurriedly, settled on keeping them on. He was eager, but he didn’t want to come across as too eager. 

He laid back on the bed and tried to look as casual as he possibly could as he attempted to listen to movements from outside the hallway. He was just about to panic, worrying that, perhaps, he had been reading everything wrong this whole time and Tony didn’t want anything from him after all, when Tony came into the doorway.

He rested his hip against the doorframe and crossed his arms as he took in the sight of Peter sprawled out on his bed. Peter tried his best to keep his breathing even, then said, “Was worried you changed your mind.”

Tony was calm when he asked, “Have you?”

Peter snorted, he couldn’t restrain it. “If I had, it would be proof of my evil twin’s existence and not me. Now, c’mon,” he said, egging him on. “Want you to fuck me.”

Tony started edging his way towards the bed like it wasn’t even a conscious movement for him, it was like he was being pulled in by a magnet. “You’re gonna kill me, kid.” 

Peter wrinkled his nose. “Okay, ground rules, you’re not allowed to call me ‘kid’ while you fuck me.” 

Tony looked a little admonished, but sighed and said, “That’s fair. Anything else?” 

Tony was close enough to the bed that Peter could touch. Peter hummed. “My safeword is ‘hydrogen’,” he told him, making sure to be as cheeky as possible. “But I doubt I’ll have to use it. C’mon,” he encouraged once again and wrapped his calf around Tony’s waist to tug him even closer. 

“Are you sure?” Tony asked him. Peter wanted to roll his eyes but didn’t because Tony looked gut-wrenchingly serious. Peter nodded, but Tony continued, clearing his throat, “Because once we start, I don’t think I’ll be able to stop.” 

“Yes,” Peter said because it seemed like Tony needed verbal confirmation. “I’m sure. I especially liked the part about not stopping, that sounds fun.”

Tony did roll his eyes at Peter then. It was okay though, he didn’t mind, as it appeared to release the last bit of tension that Tony was holding onto. He pried his belt out from its loops and then pulled his own jeans down until they hit the floor. Peter could feel his mouth practically water at all the muscles and tanned skin suddenly on display for him. 

Tony crawled onto the bed and started kissing him again. Peter melted into it, letting Tony assault his mouth as he brought his hand up to tangle in his hair. He moaned loudly when he felt Tony’s hard cock press against his own, only separated by their boxers. “You’ve bottomed before, yeah?” Tony asked.

Peter nodded frantically, then said “Duh,” because he was kind of a brat. He rubbed against Tony, enjoying the surrealism of it all before he said, “I’ve also fingered myself like, a lot, so you can go for it at any time.” It was important to him that Tony knew that. He may have been blushing, but he wasn’t a blushing _virgin_. 

“God, you’re mouthy,” Tony said, but it didn’t sound like he was complaining. In fact, he sounded rather fond. He punctuated his words by reaching into the nightstand that was next to the bed and pulled out a bottle of lube. 

In retrospect, Peter didn’t know why he had ever thought Tony would be something other than an absolute sex-god. He took Peter apart slowly by peeling his boxers off and completely coating his fingers with lube. He pressed kisses along Peter’s thigh as his first finger went in. Peter whined and jerked his hips until Tony added another finger, scissoring them inside him to stretch him out. 

Peter’s eyes squeezed shut, and he made a few embarrassing high-pitched noises when Tony’s finger curled over his prostate. He abused it brutally and relentlessly as Peter squirmed and keened against the onslaught. Peter had always viewed fingering as just a necessary step for prep, he didn’t realize that it could feel this good. Precum was dribbling out from his cock and onto his stomach as his moans got louder and higher with frequency. 

He had been trying to hold himself back as much as he could, but at one point, Tony brushed _hard_ against his prostate, so hard that black spots came over Peter’s vision and he was coming almost instantly. His cum shot up, mostly covering his stomach, but a few stray squirts had landed on his chest. He basked in the afterglow of what was maybe one of the best orgasms of his life when the mortification finally kicked in.

“Oh, God,” he whimpered weakly. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to-” 

“Hey,” Tony shushed him, his voice harsh. “Stop that. I was trying to make you come. You probably have a pretty good refraction time, right?” 

Peter nodded, albeit a little shakily. “Yeah, I’ll be good to go, just give me like, two minutes.” 

Tony smiled then. “Ah, yes, two minutes. That’s forever.” He started kissing at Peter’s thighs again, and Peter let his head flop back against the pillow with a thump. It was going to be faster than that if Tony kept going. Tony seemed completely unperturbed at how fast Peter had finished and focused his attention slowly on sucking marks into the soft flesh of his inner thighs. In this one instance, Peter’s super-healing was really a nuisance as he wanted the marks Tony was leaving to last. He wanted to be able to dig his fingers into the bruises for days afterwards so he could remind himself that this had been real. That this had happened. 

After hardly any time at all, Peter started getting hard again. “Please Tony,” he nearly mewled, blissed out from his previous orgasm but also turned on again in equal measure. “Want you to fuck me so bad.” 

Tony pressed a kiss to his stomach that was so sweet Peter had to refrain from his heart melting. Now was not the time. 

Then, Tony was pouring a generous amount of lube over his hands and started spreading it over his cock. Peter watched with rapt attention, enjoying the view of Tony’s cock going in and out of his fist as he slicked himself up. Peter spread his legs as far as they would go and tilted his hips up to be as inviting as possible. It must have worked because Tony let his hand slip free and inched up on the bed so that the tip of his cock pressed against Peter’s hole. 

He guided his cock in with one hand, as his other hand lifted Peter’s leg so that it rested on his shoulder. It was an easy position, one he was somewhat used to. Peter gasped as Tony’s dick slipped inside of him at a glacial pace. “Tony,” he keened as he circled his hips almost involuntarily, just trying to get him deeper inside. Tony growled, and Peter couldn’t help the moan turned sob that he let out when Tony finally was all the way inside. 

Peter thought it couldn’t get any better, but then, Tony started moving. At first, he went slow, only gently grinding his hips, getting Peter used to the feeling of him inside of him. Peter was already relaxed from his first orgasm so Tony’s cock barely felt like an intrusion. He clenched around him, which made Tony grunt and grab at his hips to still him. His grip was so tight it was bruising, but Peter couldn’t help but squirm against him needily. 

“Fuck me, please. Harder, faster, anything, Tony, please,” Peter begged, close to tears. As much as he loved the tender pace, it hurt knowing that it wasn’t real. Tony wasn’t making love to him. Peter just wanted him to take him apart, to fuck into him fast and hard until he couldn’t see straight. 

Peter whined helplessly until Tony started to pick up the pace, his rhythm was brutal once he got going. Peter let out guttural noises with every thrust as he clung onto Tony’s shoulders for dear life. “Fuck, Tony. It’s so good. You’re so good,” Peter slurred, feeling his second orgasm already building. 

Tony’s rhythm stuttered at his words, so Peter kept going. He chanted Tony’s name like it was a prayer until his orgasm rushed over him like a wave. It built and built until it crashed as his back bowed and his toes curled. It seemed to go on forever, elongated by Tony coming inside of him which sent zings of after-shocks all over his body. 

He was aware enough after he came to feel Tony slipping out of him. Time seemed to fade in and out as he felt a washcloth or at least, something that felt like a washcloth, rub over his stomach, chest, and thighs, cleaning up the mess that had been left behind. 

He knew now was the time he should probably think over how they were going to address the situation in the morning. He should make a game-plan and discuss with Tony about how they weren’t going to make things awkward. But he was really sleepy and could barely keep his eyes open all of the sudden. 

He blamed it on his sleepy delirious state when he made unhappy grumbling noises, reaching out for Tony. Suddenly, he needed to feel Tony’s bare skin against his, desperately. Once his hand made contact with Tony’s arm, he pulled him towards the bed. He might have used a bit of his super-strength unintentionally if the huff of surprise and quiet grunt that Tony let out as he landed on the bed was any indication. 

When Tony’s arms tentatively wrapped around him, Peter immediately latched onto him like some sort of spider-monkey. He would be appropriately embarrassed in the morning over his clinginess, but at that moment, he needed it. Tony didn’t seem to mind as Peter nuzzled into his chest, and Tony’s hands started playing with his hair. 

Peter hummed happily as he fell asleep. All the hard pressing issues could wait until the morning. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow oh wow. This fic has turned into a monster and I'm so incredibly in love with it. I never imagined that it would get to be what it is. I'm just finishing up the epilogue now, so the next part should get posted either sometime tomorrow, or the day after, and then epilogue should be up later this week. I'm very proud of this work, and I hope you guys enjoy it. 
> 
> This work would not be here in all it's glory, and probably would have never been finished if it wasn't for all the love and support I got from the Starker discord. They listened to me whine and complain incessantly, and constantly gave me motivation and cheerleading to write. You guys are the absolute best, and all the love in the world goes out to, [Jerana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jerana/pseuds/Jerana), Leah, and [Livvi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LivviBee/pseuds/LivviBee).
> 
> The real MVP is [theMadStarker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theMadStarker/pseuds/theMadStarker) who is the BEST beta in the world, and I swear this story wouldn't be half of what it was if it wasn't for her, so thank you. I'll wax more poetic at the beginning of the next chapter I'm sure. I think that's all for now, and without further ado, here's part two :)

__

Peter woke up the next morning feeling kind of like an idiot. 

He woke up in Tony’s bed, alone. It took him a few minutes to put together the pieces of why exactly he was naked in Tony’s bed. Then the flashes of memories from the previous night came back to him. He tried to make sense of everything, but nothing was clicking together right.

Tony wanted to avoid him, right? Their little soiree was probably just a blip for him. One rebound fuck to drop in the bucket, even if it was probably one of the best sexual experiences Peter had ever had. Things were no doubt going to be awkward, and Peter was going to have to go on living, ‘forgetting’ that it had ever happened, even though he really didn’t want to.

After Peter had wallowed a little bit in the bedroom and shimmied back into his dirty clothes from the night before (he wasn’t going to give in to the impulse that had him wanting to steal one of Tony’s shirts; it was creepy, he told himself, and Tony would absolutely object), he went out to the kitchen. He was about to walk out the door, head hung low, when he noticed a full piece of notebook paper sitting on the counter.

He tip-toed over to it, curious and half hopeful that maybe it was for him. The words on the page were in all caps in the blocky commanding handwriting that was all Tony’s. 

_**PETER,**_

**_HAD TO GO TO AN EARLY MORNING MEETING. YOU LOOKED SO PEACEFUL I DIDN’T HAVE THE HEART TO WAKE YOU. SEE YOU ON TUESDAY? THERE’S SOME MOCKUPS I WANTED YOU TO SEE._ **

Peter could have passed out from the sheer relief. Tony didn’t hate him. There was still going to be a semblance of normalcy again. If anything, he was kind of caught off guard that Tony wanted to see him again so soon. He had planned on Tony avoiding him for a while and giving him guilty-eyes until they could be alone in the lab together again. 

Honestly, Peter kind of wanted a little cool down period until he had to see Tony again. All of his skin and fingers and thoughts of his mouth were sending Peter into a frenzy and he wasn’t so sure he could revert back to overexcited mentee mode with the flip of a switch. 

Peter had sort of guilt-tripped Tony though, if he remembered their conversations correctly from last night. He had guilted Tony into feeling bad for him and having to spend more time with him just so he didn’t go back to college and drink himself to death. He was very mortified and had completely thrown himself at Tony just to make things even worse. 

_Tony had kissed him back, though_ , a traitorous voice in his mind wanted to amend. It didn’t seem like much of a hardship for Tony to fuck him. But Tony had a well-known track record for having a high sex-drive and using sex as a coping mechanism so it kind of checked out. He probably just needed action after his divorce, and Peter was aware enough to know that he wasn’t horrendously unattractive. He was simply a pretty young thing who had thrown himself at Tony, and Tony hadn’t resisted. That was all there was to it.

Peter comforted himself with that resolution, even if it settled cold and heavy in the pit of his stomach. He would hold onto the memories that kept replaying like a broken record in his mind because it was a one time thing that would never happen again. He pretended the conclusion comforted him as he walked out of the Tower and headed back towards the direction of his dorm when really, it didn’t comfort him, not even a little bit.

__

Peter spent most of the weekend and all of Monday psyching himself up for Tuesday. He ran through a list of casual things to say, like a script, if he got too distracted (which knowing him, he definitely would). He had done all these preparations to be cool, calm, and collected. He would be casual. He had participated in no-strings attached fucking before, and he was going to prove to Tony that he was mature enough to handle that prospect. 

It was a one time thing, and that was fine. 

It was fine until he got to the lab and Tony gave him possibly one of the brightest smiles he’d ever seen. It made his knees weak and a smile of his own shoot onto his face because fuck, it looked genuine. Tony looked so happy to see him, Peter could almost pretend that, maybe, they were something more. 

Tony pulled up the mockups like he had promised, and Peter had enthusiastically glanced over them, giving his two cents. It was kind of great, actually, and Peter was about to reward himself with lots of brownie points for being so chill when-

When he got somewhat in Tony’s space. It had been for a completely innocent reason, and he had honestly only been trying to get a better look at a hologram that Tony had pulled up since the text underneath was too small for Peter to make out from a few feet away. As soon as he had gotten close, Tony pulled him in by the belt loops of his jeans, so that their hips were flush. Peter definitely didn’t squeak at the sudden movement. He didn’t.

Then Tony pressed a kiss to his mouth like it was normal. Like it was a thing that they did. Peter’s head was kind of spinning as he processed it, but then Tony was talking. 

“I've wanted to do that since you came in an hour ago,” Tony said with an amused glint in his eyes. 

Peter’s brain was whirring and unfortunately lagging as he tried frantically to figure out what was happening. Had… had Tony enticed him to the lab for a booty call? 

Peter was really trying to understand how his life had gone from Tony barely giving him the time of day to getting upgraded to booty call status. Was it an upgrade? he wondered. Surely, he could think of better upgrades like boyfriend or partner, as an example. But then Tony was kissing him again and yeah, it definitely was an upgrade, he decided. 

“You know,” Peter said, once they had broken away for air, with a confidence he didn’t really feel. “If you wanted to get my pants off, you could’ve just said. You didn’t have to seduce me with science.” 

“Seduce you with… science,” Tony repeated, slowly and a little disbelievingly. Peter had a horrible moment where he thought maybe he had completely misread everything when Tony said, “God, you’re perfect.” Tony crowded Peter’s space. “Have I ever told you you’re perfect?” 

Peter’s mouth went dry and he was pretty sure someone had released a suitcase full of butterflies into his stomach. Peter was going to die if he kept calling him perfect like that. 

“No, actually,” Peter said, despite his thick tongue. “I don’t think you have.” 

Perhaps something could be said for desperation after all, considering after the heavy makeout session, Peter whispered in Tony’s ear, begging him to fuck him and told him about how he’d been thinking about it all weekend, which got him another onslaught of Tony calling him ‘perfect.’ He was pretty sure he could listen to Tony call him perfect for the rest of his life. Plus, the desperation got Tony to fuck him on the lab table afterwards, so who was winning?

__

Peter could admit that maybe he might have been wrong on a few things. It had not been a one time thing. If anything, it became a several time thing.

__

At first, it was fun. 

The pair, much to Peter’s surprise, didn’t have sex every single time they saw each other from then on, but they certainly didn’t refrain from sex either. Peter couldn’t get over the fact that he could actually touch now, whenever he wanted no less. He could kiss Tony until he was breathless and then drop to his knees while Tony groaned above him and tangled a hand in his hair. It was fun, he told himself. Fun. 

There was an especially memorable day in the lab when Tony and him had just had a successful trial run on one of Peter’s new web designs. After their brief celebration, Peter slinked over to where Tony was sitting in his lab chair. Peter plopped down into his lap without much preamble and immediately started wiggling around, making himself at home. He wrapped his arms around Tony’s neck, while Tony’s hands came up to his hips like it was a gut reaction. 

“Hi,” Peter said, batting his eyelashes just so, going for shy. 

“Hi,” Tony replied, a little dazed, but smiling anyway. “You know there’s another chair.” 

“Hmm,” Peter hummed, then rocked his hips ever so slightly. “I think this one will work just fine.” 

Tony leaned forward and kissed him then, sloppy, and with a lot of tongue. Peter started rocking his hips in earnest, while Tony’s grip on his waist tightened. His calloused, strong hands began guiding his movements into a grind that had Peter gasping against his mouth. “Fuck,” he groaned before it turned into a high-pitched broken whine. “Tooony.” 

“Fuck, baby,” Tony grunted, somehow tightening his grip even further so Peter’s hips rolled in tight little circles that had him losing his mind. “You hard already?” 

“Mmhmm.” Peter’s eyes slid shut as he bared his neck. Tony didn’t waste any time in beginning an onslaught to his neck. He started sucking marks into the sensitive skin there, while Peter could feel his erection harden. It rubbed against his ass deliciously, and Peter knew exactly what he wanted. “I wanna- I-” He hiccupped, choking on a loud moan as Tony’s hard bulge rocked into the crease of his ass, only making him more desperate. “Wanna ride you.” 

“Jesus,” Tony breathed right into his ear, only a half second before his teeth sunk down on Peter’s lobe. “You’re so gorgeous, sweetheart. You wanna sit down on my cock?” 

“Yes,” Peter gasped, a hot wave of fire curdling in his veins. He didn’t think he would ever get used to filthy things like that falling from Tony’s mouth. 

One of Tony’s hands moved from his hip to his back and slowly sank down until it slipped under the waistband of Peter’s jeans. The hand gripped Peter’s ass and two fingers rested against the crease, testing, only a few centimeters away from Peter’s clenching hole. “Want your fingers,” Peter begged, his hips stuttering, unsure of which touch to lean into. “Clothes off,” he said weakly, even though he meant it. It wasn’t his fault Tony was turning his brain to mush. 

Reluctantly, Tony took his hand away from his ass but put it to good use tugging off Peter’s t-shirt before he started working on the button fly of his jeans. Peter wasn’t much use, as his brain was mostly offline, and just allowed his body to be malleable whenever he could to help along the process. Tony shucked off his jeans with a little struggle after a minute, so Peter was left in only his boxers, while Tony was still fully clothed. Peter shivered at the imbalance there. 

Peter decided to use what was left of his brainpower to help Tony get off his own shirt. Peter fingered the hem at the bottom and helped him pull it off. As soon as he did, a bright idea struck him before he could toss it onto the floor. Instead of throwing it with the rest of the clothes, Peter shrugged it on, pulling it over his head. 

Tony furrowed his brows. “I thought the objective was less clothes.” 

Peter smiled, sweet as honey. He made his words soft. “You don’t wanna see me ride you in your shirt?” It was a worn black AC/DC shirt and so irretrievably Tony’s that it made something clench in the pit of Peter’s stomach. He wanted this to be real. He wanted to be owned. He lowered his one shoulder while he pouted so that the collar of the shirt would slide and reveal a patch of creamy white skin. He got to watch as Tony’s eyes darkened. 

“We gotta get these off, sweetheart,” Tony said, toying idly with Peter’s boxers. It was a bit distracting because he also started sucking at Peter’s neck at the same time. Peter managed to gather his wits enough to tug off his boxers with one hand. It got a little precarious getting them off his legs, and they nearly tangled at his knees, but eventually, with much triumph, he got them off.

Peter flashed Tony a wicked grin that was all teeth. “Your turn.” He was glad that Tony wasn’t wearing a belt with his jeans, so all he had to do was get down the zipper and fly. He got it all down rather easily to reveal Tony’s length, in boxers of their own. Peter’s mouth watered, and if he hadn’t been so set on riding him, he probably would have leaned down and blown him right then and there. He tacked the desire away for next time. He wondered how Tony would react if he dropped to his knees right when he got into the lab. “Please tell me you have lube,” Peter panted as he continued to grind his hips. 

“It’s in one of the drawers,” Tony said, right against the skin of his neck. “I can get Dum-E to-” 

“Oh my God, no!” Peter cut him off, his face going bright red. “Absolutely not.” He pressed his face into Tony’s shoulder, feeling his flush go all the way down to his chest. “Dum-E, power down!” He shouted and waited until he heard the telltale sound of Dum-E shutting off. Peter shot Tony a stern glare. “I’m not- I can’t- we’re… I’m not going to let Dum-E _watch_!” 

Tony laughed then. “He’s a robot, he’s not gonna watch.” 

Peter shook his head. “I’ll never be able to look him in the eye again,” he grumbled. Tony’s eyes were warm when he looked back up at him and it made Peter’s stomach swoop. To distract himself from that, he got up from Tony’s lap. “Which drawer, I’ll get it.” 

Tony directed him to the drawer that he thought it was in. He was right, and Peter had to bend down low to grab it. When he turned back around, the look that Tony was giving him was like molten lava. Peter took his time getting back over to him and squeaked when Tony grabbed his hips and about threw him back down onto his lap. “Fuck,” Tony said with feeling after he attacked Peter’s mouth with his tongue. “Do you have any idea how hot you are?” 

Peter looked at him through the few stray curls that had fallen in front of his eyes. “Why don’t you show me?” he whispered, moving one of Tony’s hands from his hip to his ass. 

Tony sucked in a breath like it had been punched out of him. “Now that’s just not playing fair.” 

“C’mon, Tony,” Peter said and then handed him the lube, all the while rocking his hips. “I don’t have all day.” 

“Oh, yeah?” Tony let out a huff of breath that Peter took for a laugh. “What do you have to do?”

Peter flushed again but didn’t slow the roll of his hips. “I have homework,” he muttered, and Tony groaned. 

“God, I-” Tony, _thankfully_ , started lubing up his fingers then. “I’ve got to get inside you.” 

“Please,” Peter whined, letting his voice go all high-pitched and breathy. Tony’s fingers prodded at his hole and he slipped two in at once. It was a stretch, and Peter had to consciously relax to let his fingers inside. It was always weird at first until Tony nudged against that spot inside of him. “Fuck,” Peter gasped, and then, “Yes, yes-” 

“You’re so pretty,” Tony said, but didn’t stop the crooking of his fingers or his assault on Peter’s prostate. “I thought about you all the time.”

Tony took his fingers out, and Peter burrowed his head into his shoulder so he didn’t see him lubing up his cock, but he could hear the schnick of the bottle cap being flipped open. He could also make out the glide of Tony’s hand spreading the lube over his cock. When he finally lined himself up, Peter started sinking down. He lulled his head back and choked on a gasp as Tony slowly entered him. 

“Shit, Peter,” Tony grunted, once Peter was fully seated, and his length was completely inside. 

“Yeah. Oh, fuck, yeah,” Peter whined as Tony canted his hips up to thrust. 

“Thought about this for - _fuck_ \- ages,” Tony told him, his words dirty in Peter’s ear. 

“What did you think about?” Peter managed to ask, even though he had started to roll his hips. The angle was so much deeper than the few other times they had fucked and it was making Peter’s brain slowly melt. 

“Thought about this,” Tony said first, tightening his grip on Peter’s hips. “I thought about bending you over the lab table. I couldn’t even look at you sometimes because you’d give me those brown eyes. Thought about your mouth. I didn’t trust myself in a room alone with you.” To punctuate his point, he brought one of his hands up to Peter’s mouth and brushed over his bottom lip with his thumb. “This mouth has gotten me in trouble.” Peter let his thumb into his mouth and licked over it with his tongue. The sound Tony made in response was guttural and had Peter keening and grinding into Tony’s lap. 

“I want all of that,” Peter moaned, imagining it for himself. It was like all of his fantasies were coming true. He was shivering and picturing Tony unable to control himself. It seemed almost too good to be true that that was the reason he had been pushed away. 

“Fuck, you’re perfect.” Tony breathed, and then he was grabbing Peter by the hair and pulling him in for a wet kiss. Peter’s leaking cock got trapped between their stomachs, and the added stimulation had him shuddering. “You close?”

Peter nodded shakily as he scrambled for purchase by putting a hand on Tony’s chest and circling his hips at a speed that was nearly inhuman. “Fuck, fuck, Tony-” Peter moaned, and before Tony could even get a hand around his cock, he was coming all over both of their stomachs. Tony didn’t take too long to follow him over. He grabbed Peter by the hips and thrusted up brutally into him a few times as Peter mewled and clenched around him from the aftershocks, then came inside of him with a shout. 

“Fuck,” Peter panted, only an inch or so away from Tony’s mouth. He still didn’t have his breath under control, and it felt like his heart was about to beat out of his chest. “That was hot.” 

“I think it’s going to take me a minute for my brain to reboot,” Tony told him, face flushed and pupils blown. He was so beautiful. Peter couldn’t help but lean down and kiss him, so he did. He cupped Tony’s face in his hands and kissed him sweetly, all the while wondering how long he would get to touch him like this. He wondered how long it would be until Tony figured out how hopelessly invested Peter had gotten into all of this and eventually, let him down easy. Every time they got together, Peter knew that when that day would come, it would hurt more and more. 

He pushed all of that out of his mind. He relished Tony’s arms around him for a few minutes more before he steeled himself and got off his lap. He started putting his clothes back on silently, for lack of anything to say. 

“Where are you going?” Tony asked, still sounding dazed, and Peter was definitely going crazy because he also sounded, hurt? 

Peter gave him a gentle, if not sad, smile. “I wasn’t lying. I really have homework. Like, a lot of homework.” He didn’t. Well, he did. He always had homework. But he didn’t think he could stick around and play faux-casual mentor/protege with Tony today, not after that. His knees were still a little weak, and he felt a little wobbly and unsteady in how his skin stretched over his body. He was doing Tony a favor anyways and kicking himself out before Tony had to awkwardly do it later. He wasn’t a kid, he knew exactly what their arrangement was. 

“You could work on it here,” Tony said. It sounded like an offer, but Peter knew he was only being polite. 

Peter shook his head. “All my stuff’s at home,” he pointed out logically. “Plus, you’re distracting,” he tacked on at the end, just to see what the reaction would be.

“I’m distracting?” Tony said incredulously. “ _Me_?” Then he pointed to his own chest for good measure. “I think you need to look into a mirror sometime, kiddo.” 

“Yeah, well, potato, potato, or whatever,” Peter mumbled, but he couldn’t keep the dopey grin off his face, despite himself. “Either way, someone’s distracted and that means my homework isn’t getting done.” Tony was just being kind, he didn’t know that Peter would gladly set up shop in his lab and stay forever. He didn’t know what he was offering. “This was fun,” he said, once he had gotten his jeans back on and his shoes. He was still wearing Tony’s shirt, and he was hoping to sneak out with it still on without being noticed. He threw on his jacket and tried to tuck his t-shirt inconspicuously into one of the inside pockets. He went over to the chair, bent down, and gave Tony a kiss, praying that it came across as smooth and casual. 

Tony kissed him back, and then the smile that he gave him when he pulled away made it really hard for Peter to leave. Peter got almost out the door when he heard Tony yell, “You gonna give me my shirt back, Parker?” 

“Oops,” Peter called back, a glint in his eye, before he left the lab and started his trek back home. 

__

It _was_ fun. It was genuinely a fun time. Peter couldn’t get over the lingering touches because Tony seemed to always be in his space now that he had permission to touch. His dark eyes would follow him around the room. It made Peter feel desirable, but also validated. He’d had his fair share of exploratory sex in college, but nothing was like sex with Tony. It was all encompassing. He was attentive and seemed to care about Peter’s pleasure almost consistently more than his own. 

Peter spent his time wearing shirts that were too tight and reaching for things in a way that showed a sliver of skin along his hip bones. He would test Tony’s patience, bending over the lab table in plain view until the older man would snap and crowd him against it. The best was when his hand would slip to rest on his lower back, hot and possessive like a brand at the base of his spine that always made him shudder. He would linger his hand there, like it wasn’t weird to touch him like that, like he wasn’t making Peter dizzy just from that contact alone. 

—

The fun started to run out the first time they fucked in Tony’s bed. 

Tony took him apart slowly. He laid him out like he was precious and deserved to be cherished. He stripped him down, his hands rubbing along every part of the skin that he could touch. He sucked marks into the smooth skin of Peter’s chest and stomach, like his marks wouldn’t be completely gone by the time it was morning. He mouthed over the skin until Peter was gasping for air and begging him to fuck him. Tony smiled at him, serene and beautiful. He leaned down to kiss Peter with meaning, like Peter wasn’t falling apart beneath him. 

Tony coated his fingers with lube as Peter opened himself up for him. He spread his legs and looked up at Tony with what he was sure was pure adoration. He wanted it to last, but he also didn’t know how much his spirit could take until it withered away. When Tony rested his weight on him and caged him in by his shoulders, Peter couldn’t help but think of Titan. He thought of Tony holding him then and how Tony had looked at him when he was dying. He couldn’t understand how it had gotten so out of hand. Somewhere along the way, Peter had fallen in love with him. He had fallen for him so hard that the opportunity to have him this close, to have him in this way, was something he couldn’t refuse. 

Tony worked his first finger inside of him and Peter gasped, getting used to the sensation. His thighs shook, but he did his best to stay relaxed as Tony worked a second finger into him. The burn was barely there, but Peter felt tears prickle at the corner of his eyes anyway. This was the closest thing to making love Peter was ever going to get and it all felt wrong. He didn’t want Tony to stop, though. He didn’t know if he’d be able to handle it if Tony stopped. He had never felt so vulnerable before in his life, but he needed Tony inside of him. He needed him to fill the hollow spot in his chest. 

Peter held onto his shoulder with a white-knuckled grip until Tony winced, causing Peter to pull back like he’d been burned. There was a red handprint mark on his shoulder and Peter felt a few tears spill over. “Peter?” Tony asked, and he sounded concerned. “You’re crying.”

“I’m sorry.” Peter wobbled, wiping at his eyes hastily. “I hurt you.” 

“Hey, don’t cry,” Tony crooned softly. “I don’t think I can handle it if you cry.” 

Peter laughed, which made a few more tears trickle out, but he wasn’t quite as on edge as he had moments before. He was still shaky, but he didn’t feel like he was going to splinter apart anymore. “I’m okay,” he sniffled. “It’s just- it’s a lot.” 

Tony’s brows furrowed, and his concerned expression only deepened. “Do you need me to stop?” 

Peter started shaking his head before Tony was even finished with his sentence and grabbed onto him tightly. If Tony pulled back for even a second right now, Peter was sure he would immediately shatter. 

“Are you sure?” Tony asked him seriously. 

“Yeah, I-” Peter shifted his hips so his legs fell open once again. “I really need you inside of me.” 

“Okay,” Tony said and then, he bent down and kissed the corner of Peter’s mouth. “You’re very convincing when you do that, you know.” Tony brushed a hand over his curls, looking fond. “That and your puppy dog eyes, I don’t know how I would resist.” 

“What puppy dog eyes?” Peter asked innocently, blinking his wide shiny eyes at him. 

Tony groaned, which made Peter smile and the knot in his stomach loosen. “You are entirely too powerful.” 

“Fuck me, Tony,” Peter demanded, but only as loud as a whisper. 

Tony started lining himself up and lubed his cock until it was wet and pressed against Peter’s hole. Peter’s jaw dropped open as he slowly started to thrust himself inside. He didn’t slam home like he had sometimes in the past when they were doing it quick and dirty, no, now he was taking his time. He sank inside Peter inch by inch as Peter writhed and gasped until the pressure reached its peak and he knew Tony was fully inside. 

“Tony-” Peter choked on his name as Tony’s cock pressed against his prostate. He arched his back into it, wanting to somehow pull him deeper, to get in closer. There was no space between them but it still felt like there was a divide keeping him away. “I need-” he gasped, unable to find the words or to even convey what he really needed. “Tony, please. I need-” he tried again, cutting himself off again with a sharp intake of breath as Tony continued to thrust inside of him. 

Tony started placing kisses on his neck but then worked his way up to his face. He kissed over what seemed to be every inch he could reach. He kissed over his cheek, his eyebrows, his nose, and even his eyelashes that were still wet. Peter didn’t know how to handle it. He felt closed off and splayed open all at once. He didn’t know if he should pull away or press into it. 

“I got you,” Tony said into his hair, close enough to his ear that even though the words were soft, he could still hear them. “It’s okay, I got you.” 

Peter shook as his orgasm overtook him unexpectedly. He hadn’t even realized he had been teetering the edge until he had heard Tony’s assurance. He knew Tony would always have him and protect him. He never had any doubts about that. Tony had been protecting him since he was 15. Even when Tony was shutting him out and Peter stung from the slight of it, he never stopped trusting him. He wasn’t sure there was a reality or a point in time in which Peter wouldn’t put all of his blind faith into Tony. 

Tony continued to thrust inside of him while Peter clung onto him for dear life. His cock twitched occasionally like it was on the fence about getting hard again. Peter wasn’t focused on it, instead, he was focused on Tony being inside of him. He was focused on being as close to Tony as he ever would, but it still didn’t feel like enough. He thought getting close to him would make him feel better, but it didn’t. 

When Tony finally buried himself deep and came inside of him, Peter mewled at the sensation of his cum filling him up. He wanted him to mark him, to own him, to leave something behind that Peter could cling to as he pretended that this was all casual. If this was how Tony fucked everyone he had been with, Peter could understand how he got the reputation of being a Sex-God. Peter felt wrung apart and like he was barely holding together the pieces that had cracked loose in him. He was holding on by a teeny tethered thread, but he couldn’t let go. He burrowed himself into the hollow of Tony’s throat as he breathed him in. For a moment, he allowed himself to imagine it was all real. That Tony was in love with him and this is how they would show their love to each other. Tony petted at his hair as Peter’s lashes brushed against the skin of his throat when he closed his eyes. 

“You’re so beautiful,” Tony told him softly, which had Peter shuddering. Peter’s face didn’t leave his throat, and he continued to hold onto him. He didn’t pull back until he got himself under control and was sure that Tony couldn’t see the tears that had been threatening to fall. He wasn’t going to allow himself to cry another time. 

It was too serious and not what he meant to say at all, but he couldn’t help the words that came out of his mouth in a desperate croak. “You got me.” 

He braced himself for Tony to flinch or for him to pull back. Peter’s cards were on the table and he was terrified to know what Tony had in his own hand. But Tony just smiled at him, something soft and sweet, then said, “Yeah, I got you.” 

__

The beginning of the end was a Thursday night in his dorm. He had been enjoying his luck, for once, in getting a single room, so he didn’t have to deal with roommates anymore. He had a tiny twin bed, but it was enough room for him, and his desk only took up a corner of the other side of the room. It was a lot more space than he had to work with his previous semester, and it made Spider-Man side projects a million times easier. (Even if Jason was stupid enough to be convinced that it was just a weird roleplaying/cosplaying thing that Peter had been into, and it was too good of a cover for Peter to pass up so he just conveniently left him to believe whatever he wanted.)

He hadn’t seen Tony in over a week, and by the weekend, it was going to be two weeks. He was being a good student and actually focusing on his studies, but his dick was a little disappointed now that it had gotten used to the constant action. Peter loved sex with Tony, okay. He loved it. It could probably be added to his top 5 list of favorite things ever. But the thing was, Peter wanted more. He didn’t just want sex. Sure, he had been fantasizing about Tony since forever, and he thought he would be okay with just the sex. He couldn’t get over how much he liked everything else, though. 

He liked it when him and Tony _wouldn’t_ have sex. When they would work together in the lab, or on the rare nights that Peter would come over and they’d eat takeout and watch TV until they both fell asleep on the couch. In moments like those, Peter could pretend that they were a real couple. He could pretend that he had finally gotten everything that he wanted. When he was with Tony, he didn’t get nightmares. If he ever thought of ash, he could grab onto Tony, whether it be a light brush of his shoulder or clutching onto his hand. It would remind him that he was there and that they were fine. Nobody else on the planet could make him feel like Tony did. Nobody else could make him feel as safe, or understood. When Peter would blink at him in the middle of the night and admit to thinking about Titan, Tony would know exactly what he needed. He would pull him close until his head was rested against his chest and he could tune into the sound of his heart beating. It would make the panic leave Peter’s bones every time. 

It wasn’t Tony’s fault that they were having sex all the time, either. Peter was the initiator at least 70% of the time, but it was the one time where he didn’t have to hold himself back. He could kiss and touch and hold onto him as he pretended that Tony felt even a fraction of the intensity that Peter did for him. Whenever they would break apart, Peter would have to remind himself that he was only there because he was convenient. He was there because he was easy on the eyes and didn’t have to sign a waiver to just be in Tony’s presence. 

That didn’t mean Peter didn’t still feel him like a physical magnetic pull that reeled him in. If there was any feasible way he could spend the rest of his life with Tony inside of him, he was relatively sure that he would. It was because of that very reason when Tony texted him that he missed him, butterflies erupted in the pit of his stomach as he bit his lip to hold back a smile. He thumbed out the reply, _Why don’t you come here?_ and hit send before he had time to even ponder if that was appropriate for what they were doing - whatever that was. 

He never expected Tony to be so easily talked into it or how eager he was for it when Tony called him and they started working out the details. Peter didn’t have any in-person meeting classes on Fridays and he got caught up in the idea of Tony actually coming to his room. Of Tony _being in_ his dorm, like all of his wishes come true. 

Peter couldn’t hold back his grin of delight as he braved the cold in only a sweatshirt and a thin pair of pajama shorts to let Tony in through the locked security door. He looked a little ridiculous with his hat, sunglasses, jeans, and large hoodie to help blend in and make himself look younger. Peter corralled him down the hallway and snuck him into his room. Once the door was shut, he couldn’t help but snicker. Tony had shut him up by pressing his back against the door and kissing him until he wasn’t laughing anymore. 

Eventually, Tony relented his smothering of Peter against his own door and walked around the tiny room, inspecting it. “This is a lot cleaner than I remember my own dorm room being,” he said while tracing his fingers over Peter’s desk. 

“Yeah, well, I’m not here much,” Peter replied slyly. He briefly debated if it would be forward to just hop straight into bed, but it really was the only piece of furniture he had in his room other than a sad looking bean bag in the corner opposite from the desk. 

Peter flopped down onto his bed and folded his arms behind his head. Tony eyed his bed suspiciously. “There’s no way I’m sleeping in that thing tonight. I actually would like to keep my spine intact for tomorrow.” He counteracted his words by edging closer anyway. “Have these things gotten smaller? They’ve gotten smaller.” 

Peter ignored his ridiculousness and just wiggled his eyebrows suggestively, but probably failed. “C’mon, I’ll give you a back massage in the morning.” Tony’s eyes darkened, so Peter went in for the kill. He stretched his body out so that his sweatshirt rode up, and his body looked even more lithe. “There was this movie I really wanted to show you.” 

It took a second, and Peter held his breath through it until Tony sighed and started tugging off his sweatshirt. “Does that sales pitch work on everyone?” Tony asked as he unbuttoned his jeans. “Because I can’t believe you’re not halfway to world domination already.” 

Peter grinned, and he was sure it came out feral. “Only on you.” He had to bite his tongue to hold back the fact that he only ever wanted to be selling to him. He didn’t know if Tony would appreciate the sentiment. 

Once Tony was down to just a t-shirt and boxers, he crawled into Peter’s tiny twin bed that squeaked precariously under their joint weight. Peter reeled him in so that his entire front was pressed along his back, and Tony’s back was up against the dorm wall. With a lot of shuffling and Peter wiggling his ass, sometimes unnecessarily, against Tony’s front, he gathered his laptop and got them into a comfortable position. 

Peter didn’t calculate what it would feel like. Nevermind the fact that Tony was in his dorm and that he was going to remember this night every time he crawled into this bed after a long day of class. Nevermind the fact that all Peter wanted was for Tony to stay in his space like this forever. Peter could barely concentrate on the movie that he had put on. He couldn’t process what was happening on the screen because all he could focus on was Tony being wrapped around him, and holding him like he was. Tony’s arm covered him while their legs tangled together. He whispered soft jokes into his ear the whole movie, and they were funny, they made Peter laugh, even though his hot breath right by his ear made him have to hold back shivers. 

It all felt like too much, yet not enough all at once. Peter was beginning to associate that feeling with Tony, exclusively. By the time the credits started rolling, Tony’s one hand had wandered down his pants and under his boxers while his other hand slid up Peter's sweatshirt to rub at his nipple. Peter's breath felt hot as it puffed out his mouth. He was quickly overheating in his sweatshirt but he kind of never wanted it to stop. Peter’s mouth fell open on a moan as he grinded his ass back and felt Tony's hard bulge press along his ass. 

“You’re always so ready for me,” Tony breathed into Peter's neck as his hand began to jack his length. It was already wet and messy from Peter leaking like a faucet. He keened at how filthy it all was. Tony’s hand was quickly slick from his precum and the wet echoing of his hand on Peter’s dick reverberated against the cement walls of the room. 

“I just-“ Peter stuttered on a moan. “I want you all the time.” His heart seized for a second at the admission of honesty, but then, it thudded in double time when Tony groaned against the back of his neck. He started biting a mark there that Peter knew wouldn’t last, but he wanted it to. They needed to figure out a way to mark Peter up, even with his superhealing. He wanted to keep them around and press into the bruises the next day as he remembered how they were formed. It made him feel owned. 

Tony jerked Peter off until he came and then kept going. It had already been established that Peter could have multiple orgasms due to something with the bite, but Tony was the only one who always took advantage of it. He continued to jack Peter off until Peter was squirming and choking on a high-pitched whine and gasping for air. Peter’s second orgasm had him stuttering his hips and reaching behind him to grab onto Tony by the back of his shirt for dear life. He blinked glassy eyes open as he pulled Tony closer even though they were already completely pressed against each other.

“Woah,” Peter squeaked after a moment. 

Peter’s declaration caused Tony to chuckle into his ear. “You like that, baby?” He said, his voice low and wow, okay. If there was any way Peter could have come again so soon, he would have. That was the first time Tony had ever called him _baby_ and it sounded so good coming from his mouth. He whined when his spent dick twitched. “Fuck, you’re hot.” 

Peter’s eyes drooped and he suddenly could barely keep them open. “You’re not gonna...?” Peter asked, before holding back a yawn.

“I’m good, baby,” Tony said, and he sounded like he was smiling. It made Peter want to smile too. 

Peter closed his eyes as Tony started kissing down his neck. “You could fuck me, even if I fell asleep, if you wanted,” Peter offered, not even opposed to the idea. 

“Jesus,” He heard Tony breathe out. “I usually prefer them conscious. But that’s definitely an idea. One we’ll table until you’re not actually about to be unconscious.” Tony pressed a kiss right behind his ear then asked softly, “Are you like this with everyone?” 

Peter froze, not sure what the connotations were there. “No,” he said, his voice coming out weird. “I just trust you,” he settled on, sounding small and was too tired to be anything other than honest. 

“You’re about the only one who does,” Tony replied thickly. If he said anything else, though, Peter didn’t hear him because he had already fallen asleep. 

__

The next morning, Peter woke up first. He had been so preoccupied last night that he hadn’t pulled his curtains closed in his usual nighttime ritual, so a rectangle of light blasted him right in the eye. Tony’s arms were locking him down, but Peter managed to squirm out of his grip with careful movements that didn’t wake him. Once he was free of Tony’s grip, he tiptoed around his dorm to put his laptop and phone on the charger, wiped down his stomach and groin where his cum from the previous night had dried, so it was crusty and flaky against his skin. 

Peter debated changing his clothes after he took his boxers off. He glanced over at Tony, who had rolled over so he was laying on his back. He was beautiful with his tanned skin and eyelashes fanning over his cheekbones. The sunbeam that had blinded Peter rested solidly on Tony’s chest so it surrounded him in a yellow glow. Peter could hardly believe his luck. Whatever Tony was offering, Peter would take gratefully for as long as he could. 

Peter took off his sweatshirt and then shivered at the cool air of his room compared to how warm it had been under the covers. He climbed back under them, paying close attention not to jostle Tony too hard as he did. Tony pulled him in almost immediately, still asleep, and Peter basked in his warmth. Peter, unable to help himself with Tony all laid out in front of him, started placing kisses along his neck and collarbones and anywhere he could reach. Tony was still clothed in a t-shirt and boxers, but Peter didn’t let them get in his way. He licked and nipped at the hollow of Tony’s throat until he felt him begin to harden, his cock pressed against his hip. Peter got a bright idea then and thought back to how Tony hadn’t cum the previous night. He was prepared to rectify that. 

Peter slipped down even further beneath the covers until he was completely under them and his face was level with Tony’s hard cock. He peeled down his boxers and Tony’s cock sprung free. It wasn’t all the way hard yet, but it was at least more than halfway there. Tony made a noise above him, but when Peter looked up, his eyes were still shut and he appeared to still be asleep. Peter licked up the base once until he got to the tip, then he licked his lips to get them wet, tucked in his teeth, and started sucking him down. He’d only done this a handful of times before, and most of them had been rushed and messy in the darkness at a party or the two times he had done it with Beck. And the few times he had done this with Tony in the lab, it had been rushed and didn’t allow him to properly savor it, in an actual bed, with the works and everything. Those times were nothing like this. The heaviness and weight of it on his tongue was familiar, as well as the clench of his gag reflex that he breathed through as he continued to sink further down. 

Peter got down halfway, only a few inches shy from the base, before he pulled up and went back down, starting his bobbing rhythm. He felt Tony’s cock harden further in his mouth until it was straining. Tony groaned, louder than before, and his hips jerked, causing Peter to go even deeper. Tony’s cock hit the back of his throat and he moaned. He knew Tony had woken up because his hand came up and tangled into his hair. 

“Peter,” Tony said, caught between a question and a moan. His voice was low and groggy from sleep. Peter wanted to eat him alive. “Am I dreaming? I have to be dreaming.” 

Peter pulled off his cock enough to say, “You’re not dreaming,” his own voice hoarse as well, but then he said, because it made him feel sexy, “Morning, Mr. Stark.” 

“Oh, _fuck_ ,” Tony grunted like it had been punched out of him. 

Peter grinned at him, one with all teeth, and then sunk down again, this time with a little more vigour, and he made sure to make some sloppy slurping sounds on his way down that had Tony’s fist tightening in his hair. Peter got into a nice rhythm and tried to pull out all the tricks he knew. He must have been doing a good job because only a few moments later, Tony was pulling him off. 

Peter panted as Tony’s dick fell back onto his stomach. He looked up at Tony, who brought his hand down, and traced his thumb over Peter’s spit-slick lips. “You’ve got a mouth on you,” he said, and then his eyes darkened as Peter licked over his thumb and let it go right into his mouth, up to the knuckle. “I do anything for that mouth,” he said, but his words were quiet, and Peter wasn’t sure he was supposed to have heard them at all. “I’m only good for one, though, kid, and as delightful as this is…” he trailed off, though his voice had gotten louder, and clearer. His eyes roamed over Peter’s body, under the sheets, and seemed to take in that he was naked. He tugged Peter up so he was facing him, and Peter had to try really hard not to hit him with any of his gangly limbs. “I’m not letting you get away until I’ve fucked you into this tiny ass mattress.” 

Peter’s breath hitched, even as he laughed, loud and sunnily. “I propose an amendment to the current plan,” he said professionally, but then juxtaposed it by getting more comfortable in his straddle of Tony’s hips. Their bare cocks brushed against each other and Peter let out an involuntary whine. 

“The court’s listening,” Tony said seriously, while Peter’s brain mostly scrambled. 

Peter had to bite back a stupid grin as Tony grabbed onto his thighs. “What if I rode you?” 

“Amendment passed,” Tony told him as his hands spread from his thighs and gripped his ass tightly.

After that, he opened Peter up with slick fingers until Peter was ready to go down onto his cock. He let his head fall back and moaned at how good it felt as he got Tony inside of him. The angle was almost unreal, and with Peter’s own body weight bearing him down, he couldn’t get over how deep it felt. Tony held on but had him work himself down, chasing his own pleasure. They went like that for ages until Tony grabbed his cock and started jacking it in time with Peter’s grinding. It wasn’t long until he was falling apart. 

The moment Peter caught his breath, Tony flipped them so Peter was laying on his stomach. Tony’s dick was still hard and Peter never wanted him to stop. Tony sunk back into his ass and it felt like he was coming home. Peter grabbed onto his sheets and whined. “Tony-“ he gasped. 

“You know this just isn’t fair,” Tony said as he fondled Peter's sides, his pace unrelenting. “No 19 year old who eats as much Kraft Mac and Cheese as you do deserves abs like these.” 

Peter laughed then, like it was torn out of him. He giggled into his pillow. “What’s wrong with Kraft Mac and Cheese?” He pretended to pout, but it didn’t last long before his breath was hitching and he was moaning again. He had never laughed with someone during sex like this, had never joked and teased with someone he was so comfortable with. It felt kind of revolutionary. Tony made him feel beautiful, but also smart and funny, and it suddenly became crystal clear to him that he was so in love with him, his chest actually burned from it. 

Peter came for a second time with a broken cry and it wasn’t too long after that that Tony was finishing inside of him as well. He collapsed next to Peter on the twin bed but there wasn’t even close to enough room so Peter had to adjust by resting basically on top of him, preventing him from the fate of getting smushed into the dorm wall. Peter held onto him as he tried to put the pieces back together in his mind so he didn’t feel so shattered and shaky. He held onto Tony even though he knew he was going to have to leave in a few hours and the illusion would be broken. After this, they would go back to hasty fucks in the lab, Peter reminded himself, even as he savored Tony’s embrace. And he’d have to pretend that it was fine and that everything was fine, even though it wasn’t. It really wasn’t fine at all. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks are in order again for the crew. I hope this last chapter is your favorite! <3 [Jerana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jerana/pseuds/Jerana), Leah, and [Livvi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LivviBee/pseuds/LivviBee).
> 
> Also thank you so much to [theMadStarker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theMadStarker/pseuds/theMadStarker). She read this fic and edited it back in August when it was stuck on 12k and I was worried I was never going to finish it. She has worked so hard going through this fic, and has truly beat it into submission. I'm so grateful to have her as my beta. 
> 
> I hope this fic has lived up to all of your expectations, Julie. 
> 
> Epilogue will be up either tomorrow, or the day after!

__

When Tony eventually left his dorm room and Peter got some space, he didn’t intend on avoiding him the next few days. He insisted that he was busy with school, even though he wasn’t, and that was completely an excuse. He couldn’t put his finger on what exactly was bothering him so much, but he knew being around Tony would make it worse. (Or really, make it better, because Tony had this thing where he was kind of like the sun. It was easy for Peter to fall under his beam of warmth, and Peter knew he was pathetic and would follow him around everywhere. As soon as Tony even looked at him, it was like he forgot all of his problems and reservations about their setup because how could he not appreciate every single second that he got to be basked in his attention?) 

Peter was aware enough to acknowledge that he felt morose. It wasn’t a depression per se, but it was a fog that enveloped him and made it hard for him to get out of his bed. He didn’t regret inviting Tony over, but he did kind of wish he hadn’t tainted his tiny room with memories of Tony. Tony, who had glowed from the sun streaming in from his window. Tony, who had held him like he was something precious and had called him beautiful. Peter wasn’t sure how much more of it he could take before he lost his mind. He had said over and over again that he would take whatever he could get because it was better than nothing. He couldn’t go back to the way it was before, not now, not after he had gotten a taste. It would be the sickest torture in the world to go back to the lab and pretend, to pretend like he wouldn’t bend to the will of whatever Tony asked from him. 

He didn’t say all of this to MJ, but he gave her the brief rundown that didn’t make him sound so desperate when they had their usual study session in the campus library. When Peter finished his tirade, slightly out of breath, MJ merely sipped on her coffee. She got the same thing every time, a white chocolate latte, of which she was currently peering over, her brown eyes all-knowing. She assessed Peter with her freaky silence and squinty eyes until Peter was practically squirming. 

“Well,” she said eventually, “Continuing as you guys are is clearly not an option.” 

Peter deflated. “But-” Then he stopped. He didn’t really have anything to follow up his ‘but’ with. “But I love him,” was too much, even for him, and the thought of saying it, even if just in his head, was enough to make him clench his fists and his eyes burn. 

MJ’s gaze softened fractionally like she could read his mind. Peter wouldn’t be surprised at this point in their friendship if she could. “He sounds like kind of a dick.”

“He’s not, he-” Peter protested immediately, even though he wasn’t quite sure what he could end it with. ‘He’s like staring right at the sun and yet, I can’t look away’ probably wouldn’t fare well with her. She wouldn’t get it anyway. “It’s just becoming a lot and I don’t know how to handle it anymore,” he admitted quietly.

MJ sighed like the conversation was paining her. “Because you fell in love with him.” 

Peter's eyes widened at her words and his knee jerked involuntarily and hit the wooden desk with a loud ‘bang’. “Ow,” he muttered first, and then, “I’m not-”

MJ held her hand up. “This advice thing doesn’t work if you lie to me. Also, you’re really obvious, Parker. You were already in love with him before you got your dick wet. Now, it’s just...worse.” 

Peter let his head fall down until he was laying completely against his open textbook. He supposed honesty really was the best policy. He also didn’t really give a shit what MJ thought of him, she already knew how pathetic he was. “It wasn’t real then,” he told her, his voice barely above a whisper. “It’s real now.” 

“Again,” MJ said, sipping on her coffee. “I think he’s kind of a dick.” 

“Okay,” Peter said slowly. “I’m listening to your thesis. Lay it out for me.” 

“One.” She pressed one finger against the table for dramatic effect, Peter noticed it was covered in chipped black nail polish. He cleared that thought away and tried to focus. “He established in the beginning that it’s just a rebound, but then continues said rebound. Two,” she continued, “You're so unsubtle sometimes, Parker, it makes my teeth hurt. There is no way in hell he doesn’t know how you feel about him - there’s no way he doesn’t have some sort of inkling. So you play house a little bit, have sex a bunch, and he gets rewarded with all of your love and all of your attention. There’s no way his ego isn’t getting boosted all the time with you around, while you’re over here miserable because he doesn’t feel the same way.” 

MJ was right, he knew she was right, but that didn’t make it magically stop hurting. He could feel his eyes burning precariously as he took it all in. “I just- it’s-” Peter’s words got caught in the back of his throat, but he pushed them out anyway. “It’s so hard sometimes because he’ll be so _nice_ , and I’ll think maybe… but I’m wrong. I’m always wrong.” 

MJ tapped her nose. “Yeah, that is the one thing I don’t get. Why go through all the effort? I mean, no offense, but you’re clearly easy for him, and he could have you whenever he wanted. So why the faux-dating sometimes?” 

Peter’s eyes stung as he finally said the words that had been haunting him in the back of his head since they had started this endeavor. “Because he’s lonely, and I’m convenient.” 

MJ’s eyes turned sad. “You know you deserve better than that, right? Even if he is Tony Stark, and even if you’ve been in love with him forever, you deserve better than playing the charade of an actual relationship.” She narrowed her eyes. “If you ever quote me on this, I swear to God, Parker, I’ll deny it to my grave, but you deserve someone who’s gonna love you as much as you love him.” 

“I know,” Peter said, even though it was hard to acknowledge. “You’re right.” 

“Beck was an asshole who fucked you over, but you don’t have to just keep taking table scraps. You deserve better,” MJ reminded him sternly. “You’re torturing yourself. It’s not fair to you, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, but it’s not fair to Tony either.” 

“I guess I can’t really do friends with benefits,” Peter joked, but it came out more hollow than he had been intending. MJ made a disgusted face at his choice of words, and yeah, Peter didn’t feel too good about it either. 

After that, they table their heartfelt discussion on feelings and get on with their work. It almost goes back to normal. Peter even managed a laugh when MJ asked about Gwen, the girl who lived on Peter’s floor and was in some of his classes. For all of MJ’s aloofness, even she couldn’t hide her crushes very well either. Peter promised he would introduce them if MJ joined him at the next dorm party, and MJ agreed with a roll of her eyes. 

When they finished their studying and were parting ways, MJ gave him a cutting look. “Don’t be stupid,” she warned, then softened. “No one is worth sacrificing your happiness for, not even Iron Man.” 

Peter wished he had as much faith in himself as MJ did. 

__

Peter’s brave. That’s one of his main things. Sure, he can be shy sometimes, and anxious, but he has always been brave. He has always been able to summon his Spider-Man courage like a well-worn jacket over his shoulders. He wasn’t brave when Uncle Ben died, but he had spent the following years making up for that and had followed Tony onto a spaceship even though he had no idea what he was getting into, and it was all because he was brave. (He never told anyone that it had less to do with the mission and more the fact that it had been Tony on that ship. He would follow Tony anywhere, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to let him fight aliens on another planet alone. Even if he hadn’t been much help and him dying just made things worse on everyone.) 

The point is: Peter is undeniably brave. But, and only he was aware of this, he could be cowardly too. He could be cowardly when the situation called for it, and this was one of those times. He had been mulling over MJ’s words nonstop. He listened to her advice, he really did, and it was sound advice. He had come to the conclusion that it was better for his own mental health and everyone around him to break things off with Tony. It had started to become toxic and he just - he couldn’t do it anymore. He couldn’t pretend to not be in love with him while Tony clearly didn’t feel the same way. 

But Peter was weak, and that was something he hadn’t calculated for. As soon as he got to the Tower, Tony shot him one of his bright smiles and reeled him in. He kissed him like he meant it and then started ushering him down to the lab where he wanted Peter’s opinion on some prototypes. The words were on the tip of Peter’s tongue the whole night, but he just couldn’t do it. He couldn’t make them come out. He acted like nothing was wrong and even initiated some of their usual touching and kisses just because he couldn’t help himself. Also, a dark voice in his head liked to remind him, he wasn’t sure how much longer he was going to be able to touch. 

He honestly hadn’t decided yet if Tony shutting him out afterwards would be better or worse than how he was feeling now. (Worse, he thought, even if he was miserable because nobody understood him like Tony did and he thought back to the year previous, which already felt like lightyears away. He thought back to the hole at his high school graduation and how seeing Tony’s face plastered on those magazines had felt, like he had been out of the loop, like he might as well have never existed in Tony’s narrative at all. He wasn’t sure if he could survive it, but he knew they couldn’t keep going like this forever.) 

The whole night Peter wanted to speak up, but he was a coward, so he didn’t. He kept his lips sealed and held onto Tony whenever it was appropriate. And if that night, when Tony kissed him goodbye before he took the elevator down, if he held on a little tighter than usual and kissed him a little more desperately, then that was his business and nobody else’s. 

__

When Peter thought of Tony, it made him think of nuclear fission. It made sense to him, elemental transmutation was fitting. The atoms seemed to understand that once you were split into two nuclei, you would never be the same again. It was the same for him when Tony had died. It had gotten easier to pretend, what with getting swept away with the business of college and having Tony’s overwhelming presence encompassing him. It got easier, but it never went fully away. 

The hurt of it still burned at the forefront of his mind. It bled into his skull until all it left was a pounding headache that he couldn’t run away from. It wasn’t Tony’s fault that he was a goddamn mess. It wasn’t his fault that the shiny kid he had brought back wasn’t a kid anymore and had lost his shine somewhere between one world-ending disaster after the next. There was a time where he actually believed he had been dealing, but he knew now that that had just been a facade. He had convinced himself he had been getting better when all he had been doing was pushing it down deeper. Tony could escape his grip at any moment and he was still terrified. 

He never told Tony about his nightmares. He told him about Titan, a half-truth that simmered as it fell from his tongue. He _did_ dream about Titan, and he _did_ dream about turning to ash, but he had other dreams too. In most of his dreams, he had a front-row seat to Tony dying. He watched as the light left his eyes over and over again, but he was powerless to stop it. Every time, he was just a second too late. He would wake up screaming, gasping for air as his hands twisted in his sheets. He had to fight the urge to call Tony every time because Tony didn’t need him calling at 3 AM just to hear his voice. He didn’t deserve that kind of baggage. He certainly didn’t need it from someone who was convenient. He wasn’t stupid, he knew why Tony had chosen him. He knew Tony saw the look of adoration that was constantly in his eyes, and who wouldn’t want to keep that around? There lied the crux of it all: Tony was Peter’s everything, but Peter wasn’t sure where he stood at all. 

Peter would swallow his tongue though, and keep it all inside. He had gotten good at ignoring the hurt over the years and pretending that it wasn’t there. Tony knew him inside and out, but he couldn’t be broken around him. Peter had always been selfish, deep inside. He wanted everything. He wanted a house, a bed, teasing in the morning, kisses before bed, and when he was particularly in the mood to be greedy, he dreamed of ever being valuable enough in Tony’s life to get a ring. It was almost more painful then, when he let himself dream. 

He hadn’t meant to start avoiding MJ, at least not intentionally. It hadn’t been a conscious decision on his part. But she got too close. She would peer over at him with eyes that could read straight through him. He knew it was so easy from her perspective. All he had to do was end it and move on. But she didn’t really understand, did she? It wasn’t like he could move on. He was sure a part of him would never move on. It wasn’t just that Tony was his first love, no, he had crawled inside of him and made sure that Peter would never exist without a little piece of him. He had Tony’s voice in his head, and his brown eyes would flicker behind his eyelids whenever he closed his eyes. Tony had ripped him open and only left the bare bones behind, and Peter was fine. He could take it, he had to take it, because he had no other choice. If Tony left, the whole building would collapse. 

That was the root of it, wasn’t it? If Tony left. The very idea would always have Peter’s breath catching in his lungs, unable to exhale. Peter couldn’t live without Tony, as sad as it was. And he knew from experience because he had tried. His entire existence without Tony in it was hollowed out; a garish attempt at roleplaying Peter Parker. He had lost some of himself the day that Tony died, and sometimes, he felt close to getting it back. When Tony would laugh at his jokes and reel him in, that was the closest Peter ever felt to his old self, the one whose smile was the brightest in the room and who would blush and stutter over a simple compliment. 

Peter knew he was different now, and it wasn’t just because he had grown up and was an adult. _He_ was different on a molecular level. His atoms had split and they had formed a new element altogether. He would count the freckles on his chest and arm. There were 3 under his left nipple and 4 just above his elbow, forming a shape that resembled the Big Dipper. They were the same as they had always been which was hard for Peter to understand. How could that remain the same when everything else was oozing from the Twilight Zone. Peter had come back wrong, and he wondered if Tony ever felt the same. He wondered if his bones ever warped and made his skin feel too tight. He wondered if Tony ever dreamed about being dead. 

It was dark, and Peter was slowly falling apart. He couldn’t hide the swallow of his cheekbones or the bags under his eyes. He couldn’t sleep in his dorm anymore because every time he did, all he could think of was Tony’s hands on him and how they had felt when they slipped under his sweatshirt. He had been sweating and Tony’s hands were so hot, they had felt like a brand. Peter jerked off to the memory, but it didn’t make him feel better. He knew he could see Tony whenever he pleased, but it also felt like he didn’t deserve it, not when all he craved was more. 

He started dodging MJ’s calls too and stopped replying to her texts other than the occasional one word answers. It was a dick move, and it wasn’t fair to shut her out when she had only been telling him the truth. But he couldn’t face her. He couldn’t face her when the solution to his problem was potentially more painful than the problem itself. He had decided to white-knuckle it and bare it, so he was the one who had to live with it. He was the one who had fallen in love and had gotten in his head that he could take more than he deserved and it wasn’t anyone’s fault but his own. He thought that he could handle it, he hadn’t been anticipating how much he couldn’t. 

__

Peter called himself a coward when a few days later, Tony invited him over to the Tower, and he agreed immediately. He let the word bounce off his mirror as soon as he said it while staring at his reflection. Even he had to admit that he looked awful. His hair was a mess and was getting overly long. It normally looked boyish and dare he say, charming, when it curled over his ears, but now, it just hung and twisted up, making it unruly. The skin under his eyes was a deep purple, and he looked sunken in. He took a shower before he left, hoping that would wash away some of the bitterness. (It didn’t. Tony’s bright smile as soon as he stepped off the elevator and walked over the floor of the penthouse did, though.) 

Almost on instinct, Peter was matching his smile with one of his own. He always forgot what it was like to be in Tony’s presence until he was. Tony had a way of making it all go away until all Peter could zero in on was him and him alone. Peter was a master at this point of making the rest of the world fall away when Tony was looking at him like that. He waited for Tony to pull him in, to kiss him, or maybe press him up against the wall. It had become their routine. 

Tony didn’t seem to be on the same page as he got closer to Peter and then stopped once he was a foot away. He frowned before teetering closer. “You looked tired,” he said. 

Peter had to physically refrain himself from melting into the floor. He kind of wanted to cry, but he didn’t. Instead, he said, “Yeah. Studying for finals, and I pulled an all-nighter last night.” The lie came out easily, and Peter had to keep himself from falling forward, relaxing into his arms and just letting his eyes close. He hadn’t gotten a full night’s sleep in what felt like forever and he was desperate to not feel as tired anymore. 

“Why don’t we watch a movie?” Tony murmured, sounding concerned, and Peter wanted to pretend that this was their dynamic instead. He wanted to pretend that he could tell Tony about everything that was going on in his head, and Tony would hold him until his atoms went back together and he could remember who he used to be. 

“That sounds nice,” Peter told him because it did, even if he was wrung out and dead on his feet. He could get lost in the glow of Tony’s ridiculously nice and huge TV if it meant that he would be beside him the entire time. 

They settled on the couch, and Tony put on a movie that Peter didn’t recognize. He could tell from the style and quality that it was something from the eighties, but he wasn’t sure if he had ever seen it. Somewhere after the first ten minute mark of the movie, Tony had wrapped his arm around Peter’s shoulder and had started petting his hair. It was still damp from the shower, and every once in a while, Peter would get an influx of the smell of his shower gel. It was so nice, was the thing. Peter felt fuzzy and floaty as Tony touched him and tended over him like he was something beautiful and precious. Peter so desperately wanted to be that that he could taste it, sour on his tongue. 

In the movie, the main characters were at some high school dance and the two main love interests were slow dancing. Peter blinked at them and said without thinking, “I’ve never done that.” 

Tony glanced over at him, “Done what?” He turned his attention to the movie. “You’ve never danced with someone?” 

Peter thought briefly back to his few dances in middle school and the parties that he had attended. There had been a lot grinding and twerking, sure, but never any slow dancing that he could remember. “No,” he said, his tongue thick in his mouth. “I haven’t.” 

Tony arched a brow. “C’mon, you had to have had school dances.”

“Well,” Peter said, “My Homecoming was kind of a wash, as you recall.” He had tried to make his tone as light as possible, but Tony still flinched anyway, his expression shuttering. “And I was a Junior when we blipped and then Senior year was kind of weird getting everything back in order, so… I never really had Prom.” 

“You-” Tony started but then seemed to think better of whatever he had been intending to say. He waved the TV off with such intense vigor that it had Peter startling. “We are going to rectify this.” 

“What?” Peter said, alarmed, because he couldn’t mean-

But then, Tony was standing up and smiling at Peter so invitingly that Peter let him grab his hand and pull him up until he was standing too. “I’ll teach you, c’mon,” he assured, his voice soft and gentle as he tugged Peter closer. 

“If I step on your feet, I’m not sorry,” Peter told him through the thundering of his heart in his ears because he wasn’t sure what else to say. Tony clasped his one hand in his and then brought his other one down to hold onto Peter’s waist. Peter was hyper-aware of every inch of skin that Tony was touching. It was crazy that even after all this time and all of the intimate moments that they had shared, something like this was enough to make him shiver and his stomach swoop like he was on a ride at Coney Island. 

In gene therapy, you insert a normal gene into a corrupted strand. In doing this, you can correct a genetic disorder. You can cure a wide range of diseases with this method alone without having to use drugs or surgery. You can fix a whole system with the insertion of one strand of DNA that fits just right. You can cure defective or missing genes that way. Sometimes Peter felt like that, a corrupted strand of DNA that couldn’t get anything to work, but then suddenly, there was Tony. Tony had come swaggering into Peter’s life and hadn’t stopped inserting his genes into Peter’s corrupted strand ever since. 

When Tony started moving them back and forth into a tentative rhythm, Peter thought of isolating genomes. He wanted to isolate this moment, so he could keep it forever. He wanted to extract it with a syringe, pour it into a petri dish, and keep it for observation until it went bad. They danced like that, with no music, and Tony whispering the steps into his ear. Peter didn’t step on his feet once and let his head rest on Tony’s shoulder once he got sick of staring at their feet. 

It was good, was the thing. It was too good. It was like a supernova that would incinerate your retinas whenever you got too close. All Peter wanted was for it to be real. He wanted Tony to have all his firsts and to be all his lasts. He wanted Tony to pull him in with his ridiculous charm and slow dance with him every night. He wanted to cook dinner with Tony in the kitchen until they were throwing food at each other and Tony was kissing him as he pressed him into the counter. That had always been Peter’s problem - the fact that he would always want more. He was resolute with it. He had made peace with it. A sick part of his mind told him calmly that he had reached his end, and maybe, he had. 

Tony started humming and laughed when he made Peter laugh after he swayed him a little too aggressively as a joke. Peter held onto him and took in the scent of his aftershave. He paid attention to all the little details. There was a spot he had missed when he was shaving, and Peter was close enough to make out every little pore and freckle on the skin of Tony’s face. If there had been any question of it being an illusion, those would have shattered it. Peter had to hold back a hysterical laugh at how ironic it was. Peter was getting everything he had ever dreamed of. Tony had fucked him, fucked him repeatedly, and now, he was slow dancing with him right in the middle of the Tower, but it wasn’t everything he had ever dreamed of, not really. It was more like a nightmare. 

But despite it all, Peter couldn’t let go. He had always been bad at saving himself pain in the long run. Which is why he pulled Tony into a kiss. He needed him, he needed to feel him, especially if this was going to be the last time. Because it felt like it was. It felt like the night before the end of the world and Peter was allowing himself this one last indulgence. Peter kissed him passionately until Tony pushed him back onto the couch. 

Peter relished being under him and slid his hands under his shirt so he could cop a feel at all the warm skin. Tony was reverent, ethereal, and Peter’s chest ached. “You’re everything,” Tony whispered and started sucking at the skin of Peter’s neck. Peter let out a noise close to a sob at the admission but covered it up by pulling Tony closer and wrapping his legs around his waist. _You’re everything_ , he had said, so how did Peter end up feeling like he was nothing? 

“I need you,” Peter whined, wanton and desperate, but he didn’t care. All he cared about was getting Tony as close as possible. 

“You have me,” Tony said as he started taking off Peter’s shirt. Peter had to squeeze his eyes shut as he did to hold back everything that was rushing to come tumbling out. Peter didn’t have him, and that was why his atoms were splitting apart. 

Peter arched into his touch as he kissed him. He kissed him over and over and over again and let his hands trace over the scars that littered his chest. Even if Tony didn’t love him back, it was Peter’s duty to show him his. If he never got up the courage to say it, at least he would know that he had given him this and had conveyed his love through actions. Peter kissed over the large circular scar right in the center of his chest. The arc reactor was long gone, but Peter could mourn the loss of it. He liked Tony in any form he could have him though, arc reactor or not. He licked over the solid skin until he reached the pink and white puckered flesh of his scar tissue. Peter kissed the skin there until Tony made a low noise that sent a wave of heat right into the pit of his stomach.

Tony pulled Peter up and attacked his mouth once again. He licked into Peter’s mouth until Peter was panting for breath and was struggling to get both of their pants off. As soon as Peter was down to just his boxers, Tony bent down and mouthed at the bulge of his cock through the fabric. It was only a tease, and he pulled away after a moment, but it was enough to have Peter’s mouth falling open and gasping at the ceiling. Tony kissed over his hips bones and then his stomach and said, voice gravelly, “I missed you, kid.” Peter felt like he had been punched in the stomach, and he couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t do this if Tony was going to say shit like that and give him hope. Tony looked up at him then, his eyes brown and warm. “Where’d you go?” 

“School,” Peter bit out, his voice unsteady. “But I’m here now.” 

“You are,” Tony amended, kissing his hip once again. He murmured against the flesh there, “Too much?” and it was almost quiet enough that Peter didn’t catch it - but he did. 

Peter nodded, but then pulled Tony up anyway. It wasn’t hard for Tony to get off his boxers, even with only one hand free, as his other one had a solid grip on Peter’s hair, so he could hold his head back right into the position that he wanted it in. It made it that much easier for Peter to part his mouth and for Tony to fit his over it. They breathed into each other as Tony spread open his legs. He prodded at Peter’s hole with his fingers and Peter jerked his hips away. 

“No prep,” Peter managed to get out. “I don’t- I want-” It was hard to get the words out when every one of his senses was going haywire. “I just need to feel you. I want to feel you.” 

Tony seemed dubious. “It’s been over 3 weeks. I don’t want to hurt you.” Peter bit his tongue so he didn’t blurt out that he wanted it to hurt. That was the whole point. He was hoping it would take the edge off because he was about 30 seconds away from exploding in Tony’s arms and he wanted to feel him. He wanted some way to hold onto this tomorrow because his marks would already be long gone. “I never want to hurt you, baby.” 

The pet name had Peter wanting to writhe away because it was all too much. Tony was treating him like he was his and it was driving him into a slow madness. “I want it,” Peter insisted because it was the truth. “I want you, _please_.” 

Tony seemed to think it over for another moment before he sighed, dramatically and then got up in search for the lube. “Okay,” he said when he was on his way back to Peter on the couch. “But we’re going to go slow and you have to tell me if it hurts. Deal?” 

Peter nodded and reached for him, already desperate once more for his skin. Tony smiled at him like he was in on the secret and shucked off his boxers. He covered his dick with so much lube it had Peter wanting to roll his eyes. Peter opened his legs as Tony climbed on top of him. The couch was big enough that there was plenty of room, and Peter wondered if he would ever get used to that. Tony straddled him, his knees resting by each one of Peter’s hips. The tip of his dick pressed against the entrance of Peter’s hole, and Peter let his head fall back as he started his trek to get inside of him. Peter keened once he was about halfway in and clenched around him, his senses burning from the glide. It was dumb to do it without prep but Peter wanted to feel it. With how gentle Tony was being, it didn’t even hurt that bad. It burned, for sure, enough to make Peter’s eyes water, but there was no way he wanted it to stop. 

Tony paused, a little more than halfway in, and kissed messily at the corner of Peter’s mouth as Peter gasped, his mouth open, breath stuttering on each inhale. “You’re so tight,” Tony grunted. “This has to hurt, you’re so fucking tight.” 

“No-” Peter whined and brought his legs up to rest around Tony’s waist. He wasn’t pulling him further inside yet, but he was still holding him. He wasn’t going to let him get away. Not again. “It’s-” Tony sunk just a little bit deeper and Peter let out an embarrassing noise. “It’s good,” he told him as he powered through the stretch. “You feel so good.” 

Tony let his body weight press against Peter until his face was buried into his neck. “I’m gonna go all the way in, you okay?” 

“Yeah,” Peter scrambled for purchase, grabbing onto Tony’s back. “Do it.” 

Tony, true to his warning, pressed himself all the way inside as Peter choked on a high-pitched whine. Tony stayed where he was for a while, petting over Peter’s skin, hair, and anywhere he could reach really as Peter got adjusted. He stayed still, using an incredible amount of willpower, until Peter started circling his hips without even really realizing, wanting to pull him even impossibly deeper. 

“Move,” Peter cried out, his eyes scrunched shut. His entire body was on fire, but yet, it had also narrowed the world down to just him and Tony and where they connected. “Move, God, please.” 

Tony didn’t start off at a brutal pace, and instead, gently pulled about halfway out before he thrusted back inside. He began with a slow rhythm that had Peter keening and falling apart beneath him. Peter took it, holding onto Tony for dear life, no doubt leaving bruises in the skin by his ribs, but Peter didn’t care, he didn’t care, he didn’t- because Tony was inside of him. He was living a life of epic highs and tragic lows because he never flew higher than when Tony was inside of him. 

“God, I could just,” Tony grunted, then he supported his weight with his elbows so he could get a better angle and suddenly, the angle was that much deeper, enough to have Peter moaning and pushing back. “I could live inside of you. I’d always be inside you if you let me.” 

“You can-” Peter was half delirious with how turned on he was and with the mixture of pleasure-pain that was curling up his spine, igniting all his nerve endings until he was sure his hair had to be standing on edge. He was sincere, though. His cock was pressed against his stomach, steadily leaking precum, but Peter didn’t want to cum, not yet. He wanted this to last as long as possible. “I always want you inside me,” he said, his voice coming out wrecked and broken. 

“That’s a dangerous thing to say,” Tony told him, his voice dark and raspy and just enough to make Peter squirm. “Cause I’ll take you up on it.” 

“Want you to,” Peter bit out. “I want you to, so bad.” 

“ _Fuck_ , Peter,” Tony swore, and suddenly, he was picking up his pace. It still wasn’t brutal, but it was enough to jostle Peter and have him rocking up and down against the cushions of the couch from the power of his thrusts. It was enough to make his chest crack wide open as his body made a home inside of it for Tony. Peter could feel his walls shaping around Tony, molding themselves to hold him in a vice-like grip. If it was up to Peter, he’d keep him there forever and not let him go. Unfortunately, it wasn’t up to him. 

“You’re so-” Tony started, but then cut himself off when Peter blinked open his eyes to look at him. He was so beautiful, it nearly took his breath away. Droplets of sweat were dripping down his temples, and his skin was flushed. Whatever happened, Peter had the privilege to see him like this and it wasn’t even close to enough, but Peter could dream that it was. “Peter, I-” 

Peter didn’t know what Tony had been about to say with his eyes soft, and transfixed on Peter. All Peter knew was that whatever he had to say, he couldn’t bear it. Peter couldn’t have him ruining the moment, and he wanted to keep up the fantasy that he was someone worthy of this type of passion. It felt like making love, and Peter’s atoms were splintering because even if he wanted it to be, they weren’t. It made tears leak from Peter’s eyes, but he couldn’t let Tony finish his sentence. He just couldn’t. He reared him in instead and shushed him with his mouth. He kissed him until his lips were numb and he was so close, he couldn’t stop the wild jerking of his hips as he met Tony with every thrust. 

When they pulled back, enough that Tony’s mouth was free and there were only a few inches separating them, Peter said, “I know.” He whispered it once and then again as more tears trickled out. Tony didn’t know, there was no way he could know. But Peter knew enough for the both of them, and once again, he could pretend. “I know, I know.” 

This time, Tony kissed him to silence him but with a fervor that was nearly unmatched. He kissed him even as Peter moaned wetly against his mouth and came, spurting cum all over his stomach. Tony followed him over the edge soon after, and Peter mewled as he felt Tony’s cum fill him up. With Tony inside of him, he felt whole, and he knew it was only a matter of time until he felt empty and broken again. 

When Tony wrapped his arms around him and pulled him close, the decision that Peter came to sat heavy and cold in the pit of his stomach. He couldn’t do this anymore, he knew for certain. He would have to accept the mutation of his atoms because he was a new element now. He couldn’t keep holding onto this if Tony didn’t feel the same way. The ghost of what could be was going to eat him alive. Even though it tore through every cell of his being, he knew he was going to have to break things off. Tony burrowed his face into Peter’s neck, and Peter brought his hand back to tangle in Tony’s hair. He took a deep breath and allowed himself to enjoy the moment because it was probably going to be their last. 

__

Peter staunchly allowed himself one day of sulking, alone in his dorm room with the covers pulled high over his head, before he caved and went and found MJ. This time, he went to her room and flopped straight onto her bed, paying absolutely no mind to her roommate who stared at them with a little bit of shock and a lot of horror. 

“We can’t have boys in here,” MJ’s roommate said nervously as she glanced back and forth between Peter and MJ. 

“Peter’s barely a boy,” MJ said flippantly and waved her hand to further prove her point. “He’s just here to talk about boy trouble, anyway.” 

Peter glared half-heartedly at her. Her roommate still looked uncomfortable, but at least she had half the sense to shut her laptop and mumble something about going to the Commons before she left the room. 

“So,” MJ said, looking him up and down carefully. “Do you need a shoulder to cry on or are you going to stop being a pussy?”

“Doesn’t calling me a pussy counteract feminism theory?” Peter snarked, but it was just because he was a little raw. 

“Would you rather I call you a coward?” MJ prodded, to which Peter flinched. MJ softened. “You’re not a coward, by the way. You’re just…” she trailed off, then decided to settle on, “heartsick, and it’s really killing my vibe.” 

“Yeah, well,” Peter said sadly, “It’s killing my vibe too.” 

“Peter,” she said, and Peter stiffened. She only would use his actual name when she was serious. She brushed a few fingers over his arm in a comforting gesture which was about as close as MJ would get to a hug. “You’re torturing yourself.” 

Her words were hardly above a whisper, and yet, Peter could feel each one as it hit his gut. She was right. She was always right. For some reason, her words brought tears to his eyes. God, he was so sick of crying like a fucking baby. “Yeah,” he laughed, but it sounded wicked and a little insane. “I really am.” 

Peter agreed with her, and that was the worst part. He was actively making himself miserable, and yet, he couldn’t stop. He was at his breaking point and he just couldn’t do it anymore. He was one more bad day away from splitting apart to the point where he couldn’t be put back together again. 

“It’s just really hard,” Peter said, all watery and choked. 

MJ clicked her tongue. “I never said it would be easy.” She poked at his shoulder. “But I’ll be here when you do it and after, too.” 

Peter turned to her and suddenly, he was hit with a sharp bolt of gratitude. MJ had been there for him for as long as they had been friends. She had always been a voice of wisdom and someone he could turn to. Peter hoped that he was half the friend to her that she was to him, even though he was kind of a mess. He missed Ned, too. The last time he had talked to him had been a few hours previous when they had shared some memes back and forth. Peter really wanted him to be enjoying California, and it seemed like he was from his constant updates and social media. Peter and MJ really needed to plan a trip out there whenever they got a break from school. Peter opened his mouth to say something to that effect, but MJ cut him off. “How about you figure out what’s going on in your life right now and then we’ll get to the mushy stuff and the guilt and the planning, okay? It’s not fun to plan when your head is this screwed up.” 

Peter wrinkled his nose at the comment, but he couldn’t say that she was wrong either. He _was_ screwed up, and he knew the only way that he was going to be able to solve it and feel better is if he finally confronted Tony and had the grown up conversation about what they were doing. 

Peter wasn’t sure he would come out of the conversation with Tony unscathed, but he knew he had to do it. The only thing he knew for certain was that he couldn’t keep going on the way that he was. It would hurt, but Peter hoped it would just be the temporary hurt, where it was blinding at first, but faded over time. He wasn’t so sure that anything could lessen the blow of losing Tony Stark, but he also couldn’t handle just having half of him either. 

__

The night that Peter had gathered up all that remained of his courage, he tried not to walk into the Tower looking like he was headed to his execution, but it was a near thing. He thought about what he would say the entire elevator ride up, but none of the words fit right, and he was positive that he was going to end up blurting out something stupid. Something wild and desperate like, _“Why don’t you love me?”_ or, _“What can I do to make you love me?”_ , or even worse, _“What about me is not enough?”_

Peter’s hands shook as the doors opened and he hopped off the elevator, and his heart leaped into his throat. It was all going to come to an end and he felt sick. Tony was sitting by the coffee table, the new one he had just put in that was completely clear and all glass. It had a computer system installed so it allowed for him to type and pull up graphics with a flick of his wrist. He was typing something and fluttering through different pages and images so fast that it made Peter’s head almost spin just looking at him. 

At the sound of the elevator doors closing, Tony glanced up. His smile was blinding, and Peter could feel everything inside of him crumbling. This was the moment before the storm. He had the power to stop everything right here and right now if he wanted. This was his last reprieve. It would be so easy to keep going the way that they had been, and Peter could keep pretending until he actually did fall apart. He thought that was just, maybe. But he thought back to MJ’s words, the ones that she had said in the library. “It’s not fair to you, and it’s not fair to Tony either,” his brain echoed as Tony still smiled at him. 

If Peter couldn’t do it for himself, then he could do it for Tony. Tony deserved someone better. He deserved someone who wouldn’t cling to him like a lifeline and someone who always took more than he was willing to give. With all of that in mind, Peter took a step forward and then another one and another one, until he was only a foot away from the couch. 

It was only when Tony pulled him in for a kiss that something deep inside of him snapped. He closed his eyes and said, the words coming out like ash as they left his throat, “I can’t do this anymore.”

He was met with silence. It stretched on for long enough that it made him open his eyes so he could look at Tony. Tony, who looked baffled and sad and confused, all at once. “What?” he said, a little dumbly. Then his voice was grave and serious. “Pete, what- what happened? What’s going on?” 

Peter really wanted to cry. Like, hide under your blankets and sob until the sun came back up kind of crying. This was the thing that was actually going to destroy him. “I can’t keep doing this,” he reiterated heavily. “I can’t keep doing this if you don’t have feelings for me. I just- I can’t.” He hated how his voice broke on the end, but it was fitting because everything else inside of him was breaking apart. 

Tony’s eyebrows went sky high in what seemed like astonishment. “Don’t have feelings?” He sounded incredulous, and Peter couldn’t figure out why. Surely, he had been obvious. He had always thought that Tony had known, but maybe, he hadn’t. Somehow, that made things even worse. “Peter-” 

“Don’t-” Peter stopped him harshly, and held up his hand. “It’s okay,” he said, even if it wasn’t, it really wasn’t. “You don’t… have to explain yourself to me. I get it, okay. I’m the one who got too attached. It’s not your fault, but it’s not fair to either of us. I can handle it, I just need some space to handle it.” 

“Peter,” Tony said, and Peter really wished he would stop saying his name like that, it was making everything that much harder. “What do you get? What do you think is going on here?” 

“Don’t make me say it,” Peter choked out, and he could feel his eyes getting wet. 

“Peter, I need you to tell me what you think is going on here.” His voice was stern, but he also sounded like he was explaining something to a small child and it made Peter’s skin crawl. He felt small. 

Peter sniffled. “I know I’m just your rebound. I didn’t mean to get attached, but I did, and I'm sorry. I just can’t keep doing this and act like I don’t have feelings.”

Tony sighed and then grabbed onto Peter’s hands to tug him closer. “C’mere,” he said softly. Peter let himself crowd into his space without even really thinking about it. “Who told you you were a rebound?”

Peter blinked, then he blinked again. “Uh,” he said unhelpfully. “You did?” 

“ _Me_?” Tony questioned. “False. I think I would remember saying something so stupid.”

“But- you-” Peter sputtered. “When we first got together, you warned me that you didn’t know how to be in a relationship, i.e. you weren’t looking for one, and I was convenient and-” 

“I’m going to stop you right there,” Tony halted him, then he looked incredibly sad. “I only said that to warn you that I’m damaged goods, I never meant to imply... _Fuck_ , Peter.” 

“I’m sorry,” Peter said, and it came out wobbly. “I know I took it too far, I’m sorry.” 

“Peter, stop apologizing,” Tony snapped, and Peter’s mouth clicked closed almost on instinct. Then Tony wrapped his hand tightly around Peter’s wrist in a tender gesture but also like he was keeping him from bolting. It was smart because Peter had already been plotting his escape with a well-timed web. “You are not a rebound.” 

It was like a record scratched in his mind. He couldn’t follow the thread. “What?” he said, his voice sounding foreign to his own ears. “I’m not?” 

“God, no,” Tony breathed out, and he sounded sincere. “Jesus, Peter, I’m-” He swallowed while Peter watched him. “I’m fucking crazy about you, you have to know that.” When Peter shook his head, mostly in disbelief, Tony let out a self-deprecating laugh. “Well, I am. I’m in love with you, and I’m sorry if whatever I said led you to believe that you were just a rebound.” He stared at Peter intently. “You were never that, you were always something more.” 

Peter could only blink owlishly at him, astonished. “You love me?”

Tony sighed, appearing tortured. “I love you. But clearly, I’m the shittiest boyfriend on the planet if you didn’t even know that or know that we’ve been dating.” 

Peter was crying now. He could feel the tears as they rolled down his cheeks. “You love me?” he repeated again because he still couldn’t wrap his brain around it. It didn’t feel real. 

“I love you,” Tony said with conviction. “I’m hopelessly and completely in love with you.” 

As soon as the words left his mouth, Peter was launching himself forward. He crawled into Tony’s lap and flung his arms around his neck. Tony let out a grunt that sounded like an “oof” as he took on Peter’s weight, but Peter didn’t care. He didn’t care. He was basking in the fact of being wrong. It had never felt so good to be wrong. Peter tried to piece together all of this new information as it fell into place over all of his memories and the scenes that replayed in his head. Tony had loved him and had loved him this entire time. It hadn’t felt real because Peter was desperate and making things from nothing. It had felt real because it actually had been. Peter felt equal parts stupid but also relieved. 

Peter’s whole world had been tilted on its axis and he couldn’t get over it. He burrowed even closer to Tony, wanting to get as close to him as possible. Every beat of his heart seemed to get caught up in the information that had just been given to him, and it pounded to the chant of, “ _he loves me, he loves me, he loves me._ ” 

“You’re an idiot!” Peter exclaimed once he pulled himself back enough to look at Tony. “But it’s okay,” Peter murmured. “Because I’m an idiot too.” Peter kissed him desperately, throwing his arms around Tony’s neck to pull him in deep. He kissed him like he was dying, and he kind of had been, when he had thought they were in limbo. He was done making himself miserable over dumb things. 

Tony, eventually, was the one who pulled back and pressed their foreheads together. “We’re dating,” he said, with a sense of finality. “Just in case that wasn’t clear.” 

“That’s good,” Peter said, smiling. “And I love you too,” Peter told him, so there would be no confusion. “I’m really fucking in love with you, just so we’re on the same page.” 

“Glad we’re on the same page.” Tony snorted in what was supposed to be humor, but it came out a little too choked up for Peter’s taste. He could fix that. He now had all the time in the world to fix that. 

“Now that we’ve figured that out,” Peter started and got more comfortable in Tony’s lap. He looked up at Tony with that look he knew got him every time. “You gonna show me how much you love me?” 

(And Tony did. Peter ended up sprawled out on the rug next to the couch because there was no way that they were going to make it to the bedroom, not for the first round, anyway. 

Tony took him apart slowly and fucked him, making sure his pace was glacial and deep. He fucked him and held onto him until they were both drenched in sweat and Peter had no idea how much time had passed. Tony watched him as his Adam’s apple bobbed and he occasionally let his head drop back, an involuntary motion. Every time it happened, Tony would pull him back with gentle fingers against his jaw until he was looking at him again. Peter had tears welling up in his eyes from it, from every press of Tony’s against his insides that made him feel connected to Tony. 

Tony had a piece inside him forever, now, and there was no way Peter was ever going to be able to let him go. He told Tony, his voice broken, “I love you.” He held his breath as he waited, counting his heartbeats, and _then_ Tony said it back. He said it like he couldn’t hold himself back. He said it into Peter’s mouth as he kissed him, his words accompanied by a grind of his hips that took Peter’s breath away. 

It went like that until they both came. It was a push and pull that had Peter going mad until they finished. This time, Peter’s orgasm built and built, until it washed over him in a slow moving glow, flowing into his veins like molasses until his whole body was buzzing from it and he felt tethered together only by a thin string. The feeling of Tony coming inside of him brought him back to reality as he clutched him. His grip was bruising tight but he needed Tony as close as possible. Now that he knew that he had him, he couldn’t let him go. He wasn’t sure if there was ever going to be a universe or a point in time where he was going to be able to let Tony go. 

Tony held him as their sweat dried on their skin and they both started getting sore from their position on the floor. It didn’t matter though, none of it mattered because Tony was inside of him. Peter had let him make a home there and now, he wasn’t going to leave. Tony eventually took him to bed as Peter fussed idly over his back where there were bruises forming from his grip. The apology was on the tip of his tongue, but Tony shushed him and instead, kissed at the hollow of his throat. He couldn’t help the dopey sleepy grin on his face as Tony guided his lax body to get under the covers and then pulled him against his chest. It felt right. It felt normal. It felt like they were finally working together.)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Epilogue. Aka, the end of the ride.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AH! I can't believe I finished this, and I can't believe it's over. Thanks a million to everyone who read this and supported it while I was working on it, and to anyone who is reading it now. 
> 
> Shoutout again to the best beta, [theMadStarker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theMadStarker/pseuds/theMadStarker) <3

— _ **Epilogue**_ —

It was later, in the middle of the night, when Tony turned to him and whispered, his voice quiet in the dark, “It was for you.” 

Peter reared back as if he’d been slapped. “What?” he asked hollowly. “What was for me?”

“Everything,” Tony said gravely, then winced. “But mostly, the snapping and saving the planet. But it wasn’t about saving the planet.” He propped up on his elbow so he was facing him properly. “It was for you. It was always for you.” 

“Tony-“ Peter admonished, his own voice getting caught on the word and cracking at the end. “You- you can’t just...” He felt the tears prickle in his eyes. “Don’t ever do that again.” 

“Peter-“

Peter shook his head. “No,” he said forcefully. “You don’t get to do that. Imagine how it would have felt if I had put on the gauntlet and snapped.” He watched as Tony flinched. “Yeah, that’s what I thought. I can’t-“ This time, he couldn’t hold back his tears and a few glided down his cheek. This was it. When Peter had to put his big boy pants on and be vulnerable. “I can’t have you leave me.” 

“Peter, baby-“ Tony started, but then rolled over so he could wrap his arms around Peter instead. Peter sobbed into his shoulder, unable to stop once the first few tears had been let free. 

“I thought you were dead and it was the worst moment of my life. You can’t-“ He choked, still talking through tears. He was trying to hold them back so hard that his throat felt raw and his forehead throbbed. 

“I’m sorry,” Tony said, and he sounded equally as wrecked. “I’m not going to leave you. I’m going to keep you forever.” 

“I love you,” Peter gasped and then said it again. Tony kissed him through his tears, and he couldn’t stop saying it. He said it into Tony’s mouth every time they broke away for air, and he'd say it until Tony kissed him again like it was beyond his control. 

When Tony moved down to his neck and then collarbone, it was his turn to whisper it reverently into the skin there. “I love you, I love you, I love you,” he chanted in-between kisses down Peter’s sternum. 

__

The next morning when they finally stumbled out of bed, Peter had enough wits to ask petulantly, “So wait, when’s our anniversary now?”

Tony laughed, and it sounded like music to his ears. “We can go with today.”

__

On their six-month anniversary, things were better. Peter was under a lot of stress for finals so they didn’t get to celebrate it until it was about three weeks after the original date. 

He had been going to therapy, caving after Tony had suggested it again. It was beginning to help, and Peter actually felt like he was back on solid ground. He still didn’t feel like his old self, but that was okay. He had mutated into something new, something even better than what he had been before. He still had nightmares, but now, when he woke up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, he had warm arms that would pull him close and whisper, “You’re okay. It’s okay.” It wasn’t a magical cure, but it did make things feel more okay. Peter was a new element now, and he had never been happier. 

It didn’t even matter that Tony had gotten them fancy reservations because as soon as they saw each other in their suits, they wouldn’t let the other leave. Tony had peeled his suit and the following undershirt off of him as he fucked him on the floor. Peter’s hands scrambled to hold onto the gray carpet next to the couch. He couldn’t help but think back to the first time that Tony had fucked him in this spot. He remembered how raw it had been but also how he had never felt more loved. He came with a cry of Tony’s name as Tony buried himself deep inside. 

When they made it to the kitchen, a few hours later, with no clothes, Peter started heating up some frozen waffles, much to Tony’s chagrin. He scarfed a few down dry and offered Tony some bites once he sidled up behind him and rested his hands on Peter’s hips. 

Peter hoped he would feel this warm and content forever. “Happy anniversary, baby.” 

Tony placed a sloppy kiss by his temple. Peter wasn’t sure where he had initially been aiming for. “Just 204 days.” 

Peter smiled, glancing sneakily at the stove clock. “And 12 hours. You sick of me yet?”

“Status unclear,” Tony told him. “I’m just gonna have to keep you around for further study.”

__

Peter hadn’t kept up with Beck since the breakup and the night of drinking that had kind of changed his life forever. There hadn’t been a need. Beck was an asshole who had fucked him over, but Peter could admit that he had done some things wrong too. In all truth, things with Beck would never have lasted because he had only ever been a placeholder for him. 

Peter was staying at the Tower, because he seemed to always be there. Him and Tony hadn’t had a discussion about him moving in yet, but he practically had anyway. Tony never complained when more and more of his stuff started appearing, and he knew they were going to have to have a real conversation about it soon because Peter’s semester was almost ending and he really didn’t want to apply for a new room. Not when the bed at the Tower was so enticing (or rather, the person who occupied it with him was.) 

Peter was free from his classes for a day, and somehow, Tony had gotten roped into an Avengers meeting, which meant Peter got roped into it as well. He knew Tony was grooming him for an actual spot on the team, and when propositioned, Peter wasn’t going to turn it down this time. If they were both going to this meeting though, Peter was going to need coffee and a lot of it. He convinced Tony to join him in going to the coffee shop down the street and up the corner from the Tower. It was a small cafe with homemade drinks and exposed brick walls on the inside. It looked completely out of place in downtown Manhattan, but that was partially why Peter was so obsessed with it. 

Once they got there, Peter shooed Tony away to go get a table for them. He had brought some notes that he wanted to go over before the meeting. It was important to Peter that he knew his stuff and impressed the other Avengers. Before, he had been worried about being seen as a kid, and now, he didn’t want to be seen as just Tony’s partner either. He wanted to solidify his worth on the team without him, even if Tony would be by his side the entire time. 

Peter ordered their drinks without a hitch, despite his tired brain. He had memorized their orders a long time ago back when he had first found this place. He scooped them up once they were ready and made sure to throw a few loose dollars into the tip jar on the counter and smiled at the girl with purple hair and an apron who seemed grateful. He started making his way back to the table but was stopped about two feet away from his destination. 

“Peter?” He heard a familiar voice inquire, and he froze. 

Peter glanced over at the table and made brief eye contact with Tony before he turned around. “Hey,” he said, “Uh, what are you doing here?” 

Beck hadn’t changed much, he still looked the same. He was in jeans and a blue cable knit sweater. He held up the coffee cup in his hand. “Just getting coffee,” he said, then smiled at Peter. It was kind of sad that Peter used to think his smile was charming. “What are _you_ doing here?” 

Peter laughed a little nervously. He gestured to the two cups in his own hands. “Just getting coffee,” he parroted.

Beck’s eyebrow arched high. “That’s a lot for you, are you cramming?” 

“Well, actually-” Peter started but cut himself off when he felt a hand on his hip. He turned his head and saw Tony suddenly at his side.

Tony bent down so he was close to his ear, just for a second, and said inconspicuously, “You looked like you needed saving,” before he straightened back up. Peter had never been so grateful for him in his life. “Thank you, sweetheart,” Tony crooned, grabbing his coffee from Peter’s hand, then he averted his attention. “I don’t think we’ve been introduced,” Tony said, as he leveled his gaze onto Beck. 

Beck smiled at him with all teeth. “No, I don’t believe we have. I’m Quentin, Quentin Beck.” For a terrifying moment, Peter thought he was going to reach out for a handshake, and he probably would have died right there on the spot. 

Peter watched as Tony started slotting the pieces together and saw when it clicked for him who he was. “Beck, right. You were Peter’s TA, Organic Chemistry, was it?” Peter startled over the fact that he had remembered. 

“The students call me Beck,” Beck said, and Peter had to hold back a flush of irritation. Yeah, the students called him Beck and all the ones he had fucked did too. 

“Well as fun as this little catch-up has been,” Tony said dismissively, then made a point to check his watch. “We really should be heading out. Duty calls, people to see, places to be and all that.” He placed his hand in a tight hold over the back of Peter’s neck in a gesture that couldn’t be seen as anything other than possessive. It sent a wave of heat through Peter and made him feel fuzzy. 

“We should really go,” he agreed and shot an apologetic look Beck’s way. “It was nice seeing you, and I wish you luck with… everything,” he tacked on, more to be polite than anything. It really hadn’t been nice to see him, but Peter didn’t really feel like hashing shit out in the middle of a busy coffee shop. Especially not with Tony’s hand like a brand on the back of his neck. Peter handed one of the coffees to Tony, and then he crossed the couple feet to grab his notes that he had given to Tony to put on the table. “See you around,” he said awkwardly before grabbing onto Tony’s arm and hauling him out of the cafe. 

As soon as they got through the doors and were about halfway down the block, Peter let himself groan loudly. 

“Ugh. That was terrible. Absolutely terrible. I hated that.” He pinched his face into an expression that mocked Beck’s smug smirk. “ _The students call me Beck,_ ” he mimicked, using a ridiculous voice. “What an asshole, I swear he-” He stopped short when he saw the look on Tony’s face; it was thunderous. “Tony? What’s wrong? Are you okay?” 

“I’m fine,” Tony said, but it came out tight and terse. “I’m peachy.” 

“Are you mad at me?” Peter asked anxiously. He didn’t think he was, but he couldn’t place the crackling energy around them. 

Tony stopped then, so they were both just standing on the sidewalk. “What? No.” 

“Then what’s…?” Peter trailed off, clutching tighter onto his notes. 

“ _Fuck_ , Peter,” Tony swore. “I just-” he halted, taking a step closer, and that was when Peter got a better look at his eyes - they were dark. Oh. _Oh_. “I know it’s fucked up, but I can’t stop thinking about how he touched you. It’s driving me insane. I hate knowing he put his hands on you.” 

Peter licked his lips, then said breathily, “It’s not fucked up.” 

As soon as the words left his mouth, Tony was on him. He crowded him back against the wall lining the sidewalk. Peter’s notes fell down onto the ground as he somehow managed not to spill his coffee everywhere. Tony kissed him then, with fervor. Peter made a noise against his tongue but relaxed into it and reeled him in closer by his jacket. 

“God, baby,” Tony panted against his mouth. “The things you do to me.” He brought his lips down to Peter’s neck and sunk his teeth into the skin there. “I want to mark you up everywhere.” 

“Yeah,” Peter panted back and bared his neck even further on instinct before he remembered that they were in public on a very busy street no less. “Tony,” he whined and wanted to roll his eyes at himself because it was supposed to have come out stern or chiding, not desperate. “You gotta- Tony! We’re in public!” 

Peter’s squirming and declaration seemed to snap Tony out of whatever haze he had been in. “Jesus, I’m sorry,” Tony said and pulled away. 

Peter didn’t let him get far and tightened his hold on his jacket. “Oh, no, you’re gonna fuck me. You have to now. Just back home where we won’t get arrested.” Peter didn’t even notice the slip until Tony was caging him in again.

“Yeah? You want me to take you home, baby? Let me take you home.” He said them into Peter’s ear like those words were his, like they belonged to him only. Peter knew by now that he belonged to Tony, but the prospect of it still made him dizzy. 

“Take me home,” Peter confirmed, and then he bent down to start putting back together all of the notes that he had dropped. He batted Tony’s wandering hands away as he tried to ‘help’ and was really more of a hindrance. When they started their walk back, Peter said coyly, “Do you think they’d push back the meeting for us?” 

Tony huffed out a laugh, bright and melodic. “Not a chance.” He brought his hand up though and held onto Peter’s neck in the same possessive gesture he had done before. It made Peter’s knees immediately turn to jelly. “But I’m Tony Stark, and you’re Spider-Man, so I think they’ll wait.” 

__

By the time they got to their one year anniversary, the sight of seeing each other in suits was still burning hot, but it wasn’t enough to miss their reservation over. Tony was staunch in his plan to take Peter out to a fancy restaurant and wine and dine him. Peter couldn’t care less about any of it, but he got a little mushy over letting Tony have his fun. They still weren’t public with their relationship, for a lot of reasons. Some of them were because of the age difference, but most of them were in protection of Peter’s identity. If it came out that a random kid from Queens was dating Tony Stark, there would be investigations and people digging for answers as to why Peter was so special. Peter knew by now that Tony wasn’t just with him because of all the powers that came with the spider-bite, but the general public wouldn’t be as keen to put on the rose-colored glasses. So it was smarter for them to keep it under wraps until Peter was eventually comfortable with going public. The headline, “ _Iron Man Dating Spider-Man_ ” was a lot cushier than “ _Tony Stark Shacks up with Poor Barely Legal Twink_ ,” anyway. 

They sat at a dimly lit booth in the back of the restaurant while Tony ordered for them in French and Peter laughed at him over it. Tony teased him about having no etiquette until they were both laughing and Peter threatened to kick him under the table. Tony ordered a wine that cost more than the rent did at Peter and May’s old apartment. It was a dark red, and Peter drank it down until he was warm and tipsy. A low buzz settled under his skin and he licked his lips, positive that they had to be stained a deep cherry from the wine. Tony watched him. Peter preened under his gaze and grinned when Tony asked for the check. 

When they left the restaurant, Tony went to call for a car but Peter stopped him. The night air was kind of brisk, but the lights from the signs of the various businesses on the street lit everything up into a soft technicolored glow. There weren’t that many people lining the street, and Peter recognized where they were. Peter slipped his hands into Tony’s back pockets and smiled up at him. “Let’s go on a walk. C’mon.” 

Tony laughed and shook his head, but he followed when Peter tugged on his arm and started pulling him down the street. Tony linked their hands together, and the smile that Peter shot him had to have been blinding. They walked down the street hand in hand as Peter buzzed from the wine and from the great evening. He never felt better than when Tony was by his side. He wasn’t slingshotted into the highs and lows like before because Tony was a constant presence now. He wasn’t worried whenever he wasn’t with Tony because he knew he’d be waiting for him whenever he made his way back. Tony wasn’t a supernova anymore, he had morphed into a fuzzy blanket that kept Peter safe and warm. 

The couple walked for a while and turned down a few corners. Peter was practically vibrating when he saw the glowing neon sign down one of the streets - the one he had been hoping to find. It was an arcade, a kind of dingy one at that. It had been around a while, and him and Ned used to frequent it all the time back in high school whenever they found themselves uptown. Peter excitedly led Tony to the front of the arcade and stood by the double doors to get in. “So,” He bit his lip, suddenly nervous when he saw Tony’s furrowed brow. “You ever play skee ball?” 

Tony grinned then, ferally. “Oh, I’m gonna kick your ass, Parker.” 

Peter was sure he was glowing - he had to be. “It’s on!” 

Peter pushed through the double doors with Tony close behind, and they made their way to the rows of skee ball machines towards the back corner of the arcade. Instantly, Peter’s ears were ringing from the background noises of all the different games and the people all around, cheering and talking. It was easy to tune them out with Tony’s hand pressed into his. 

They started their first round jovially and agreed to do best out of seven. By the second round, they had both shucked off their jackets and threw them onto the empty lane next to the one they had decided to take hostage. Both of their sleeves were rolled up, and Peter was in the zone. They trash talked each other and Peter was having the time of his life. It took up until the fourth round for Tony to realize that Peter had an unfair advantage with his senses. Tony was a sore loser and trash talked him for cheating. Peter argued viciously against all his accusations until Tony kissed him up against the lane. The timer buzzed eventually, telling them the time had run out on the game. Peter glanced over at the score and saw that Tony had won because he hadn’t gotten a chance to score. He crowed in faux-anger and started mouthing off at how Tony was actually the cheater until Tony was kissing him again and the rest of his defense died in his throat. 

Their kisses pretty quickly turned hot and handsy. Peter, thinking with his dick (and his brain! but mostly his dick), steered them towards the back where he knew there was a bathroom with a lock. A lock! 

He opened the door blindly with his one hand behind him as Tony wouldn’t let his mouth go for even a second, and then he shoved Tony inside, maybe using a bit of his super-strength if Tony’s huff of surprise was any indication. He kicked the door closed, and then Tony was on him and crowded him up against the wall. 

Tony kissed him messily with a lot of tongue and grabbed Peter’s hips so he could slot them together. Peter rutted against him and was glad Tony was keeping his mouth busy so he couldn’t smirk over the surprise he had up his sleeve. The morning had involved Tony waking him up by fucking into him slowly. He kept him right on edge and fucked him for what felt like hours until Peter came so hard that his whole body shook from it. 

Tony pulled back and pressed their foreheads together. “I could eat you alive,” Tony said with feeling. “I’ve been a bad influence on you.” 

Peter snorted. “I was bad before you got your hands on me,” he snarked and wiggled his hips for good measure. 

“God, Peter, I-” Tony swallowed, and Peter watched his Adam’s apple bob. “I’ve gotta get inside of you, I’ve gotta touch you, anything. I’m going crazy.” 

Peter got close to his ear then said, “Why don’t you take off my pants, Mr. Stark.” 

Peter loved how Tony still reacted to that and loved watching his eyes darken. Listening to Peter’s command, he started pulling down his pants. Peter flipped his body around so his palms were flat against the wall. He arched his back and spread his legs a little bit to get a better, more secure stance against the tile floor. He flushed a bit at the idea of so obviously presenting to Tony but another voice in his head, one that was primal and burning with lust, just reminded him how hot it was. He wanted Tony to _look_. 

Tony pulled off his pants and his boxers and Peter knew exactly when he saw it because he let out a whoosh of air like it had been punched out of him. “Oh, fuck,” he groaned, and the sound alone had Peter wanting to moan against the wall. “You didn’t shower?” 

Peter shook his head. “Nah,” he panted as Tony’s fingers prodded at his hole. “I’m still so wet,” he sucked in a breath, dizzy just from the arousal alone. “I’m so open from when you fucked me this morning I bet… I bet you could just slide right in.” He still had Tony’s come inside of him from that morning. It was mostly dried, but even so, it was wet enough to work as some makeshift lube. Peter got hot at the realization that Tony was gonna fuck his own cum back into him. “Fuck this is hot,” Peter whined because his brain to mouth filter was gone. 

Tony chuckled, but it sounded desperate. “You’re telling me, baby, _fuck_. I gotta get inside you.” 

“Please,” Peter keened, desperate himself for it. He heard the telltale rustling of Tony pulling down his own pants, and then suddenly his tip was nudging against Peter’s entrance, just holding his hole open. As soon as Tony was inside of him, Peter let his head fall back onto Tony’s shoulder, and he stared up at the ceiling. “Oh, yeah, that’s it. Fuck, that’s it.” 

“I know you love my cock, sweetheart. Can’t get enough of it, can you?” 

Peter shook his head. “Mmm, want it. It’s so good.” His eyes were glassy, no doubt, and he got lost in the feeling of Tony inside of him. The rest of the world faded away. All that mattered was that he belonged to Tony, and Tony was inside of him. 

Tony nipped all over his neck as he thrusted into him. “Happy anniversary.” 

Peter gasped and tried to match each one of his thrusts with the rolling of his hips. He reached back to grab onto Tony’s hair. “Just so we’re on the same page,” he said blearily, trying to keep his focus even though Tony was fucking him into oblivion, “You better fuck me like this every anniversary, mkay?” 

Tony laughed into the hollow of his throat but never slowed his thrusting. “Oh, I’m counting on it.”

__

Their two year anniversary involved them in the Tower eating takeout together in the dark, both too tired to plan much as they had just spent the better part of the last week fighting off the latest round of alien supervillains who had tried to hash their shit out on New York. They had been defeated, but Peter was still somewhat healing from his injuries, and Tony’s latest Mark had taken some of the worst blows it had ever seen and needed to be completely rehauled. Peter didn’t really mind the lack of flair. He would have spent his anniversary eating ramen on the kitchen floor if he got to spend it with Tony. 

(And he was completely not expecting when-)

When Tony got down on one knee and pulled out a ring from his pocket, pinching it between his pointer finger and thumb. He said, shakily, as Peter’s jaw dropped. “Peter Benjamin Parker,” his throat clicked. “I watched you die. Then we brought you back. Ever since you’ve been back, I’ve had the pleasure of watching you almost die nearly every month. You’re it for me, and I’ve subjected myself to a life of watching you almost die. But in the times you’re not giving my own hero-complex a run for its money, would you want to come home to me? Forever?”

Peter’s breath stuttered as he said, “Ask me. Ask me, nicely.” 

Tony’s gaze never broke his as he asked, “Will you marry me?”

Peter couldn’t even help the choked sob he let out as tears began spilling down his cheeks against his will. “What, like I’m going to say no?” He flew over into Tony’s hands so aggressively, he felt Tony almost drop the ring but he still managed to hastily hold him. 

“Yes,” Peter said wetly. “Yes, I’ll marry you.” Then he repeated the words that had become a mantra to them. “Just so we’re on the same page.”

**Author's Note:**

> leave a comment! i know you wanna! but if you made it here and are reading this, thank you. it means the world. you can find me on twitter, tumblr, or discord @venomondenim. stay safe out there kiddos.


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